Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
Labour had opposition largely to itself then, Reform were nowhere.
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
There's been a few good news anecdotes on here about the NHS, so to balance things up I thought I'd share a story from my mother of a false economy leading to much greater cost.
"A resident here, Harry, went in to [an outer London] private hospital as an NHS patient for a hip replacement, sent home in a TAXI 2days after op, dumped in the carpark, I don't know how he got to his flat but the wound opened, he is now very ill in NHS hospital."
My mother has been recommended surgery to correct a case of Cavus foot that has developed as part of her Parkinson's, but recovery from surgery requires keeping weight off the foot for six weeks, so consensus among Parkinson sufferers is that the surgery is a ticket to requiring a wheelchair - at further expense for the NHS.
The NHS do seem overly focused on surgery as the cure for all ills, but then completely neglecting what happens afterwards.
I think, Mr LP, that your first case is a criticism of the private hospital, although also perhaps of the contracts manager in the NHS. When I worked in a private hospital, for a short time in the 80's, the surgeons always sent cases where there had been problems to the nearest NHS hospital.
With my Aunt, the lack of coordination between the various bits of the hospital (NHS) and the care teams outside was chronic.
Because I was down as next of kin, they started phoning me to ask what the other people were doing!
Having been on both sides of that particular fence I sympathise. Sometimes it doesn't work well; other times at all!
Everyone was well intentioned and hard working. The system wasn't letting them do their job.
I found myself sketching, in my head a web based* tool that would present, per patient, documentation, actions taken, actions to take, alerts, contacts in the various agencies that are part of the solution for that patient....
*So runs on everything - laptops, desktops, tablets and phones.
EDIT: It reminded me of an occasion when I saw a contractor for the road people trying to dig a hole with a shovel. No chance with that tool - he was hammering away, giving it his best, but...
You see so many things in hospitals and care settings where you can't help but think - give me a month or ten and I'll have that sorted.
The problem is that they work in silos and are forever running to catch up.
And some of those problems are because someone thought "give me a month or ten and I'll have that sorted", without thinking of the implementation challenges or broader interoperability issues! Although more of them are probably tight budgets.
Inside the Tories’ handling of the Mandelson saga:
✅LOTO + Whips playing a Commons blinder 😎‘We’re getting quite good at this opposition thing’ 📈And a shadow cabinet meeting on polling – Badenoch is leading the Party, like Cameron
She is doing well only relative to the calibre of modern politicians, but that is probably enough. She ain't no Cameron though.
Rayner's deprived upbringing is not dissimilar to that of JD Vance.
Both should be applauded for finding a way to progress upwards from a difficult start in life.
That doesn't mean though that you should necessarily want either to be in charge of their country.
Though it may be interesting to note people who condemn one of the pair for their background while praising the other for it.
JD Vance was a lawyer with a degree from Yale
It was the Marines that saved JD Vance according to himself in Hillbilly Elegy.
Vance's MOS (Military Occupational Specialty) was 4341 (Combat Correspondent, id est typist) that makes him a POG (Person Other than Grunt) and the much despised and lowest form of USMC life.
No doubt all true. But in the book iirc the point he makes is more that the initial induction and training turned him around. For example, he regularly ate healthy food for the first time in his life.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Laughable to suggest that Rayner hasn't worked hard.
Her upbringing was somewhat more difficult than Wes Streeting, whose dad played a significant role in his upbringing.
Rayners mum was illiterate & was bi-polar. Angela Rayner was by most accounts the primary carer for her mum and her 2 younger siblings from aged 10.
I know she's not everyones cup of tea.
Not sure why you are embarrassing yourself with this nonsense.
I admire her for reaching the places she has but I despair of her apparent hatred of 'the Tories'. Making politics too tribal does no-one any favours. We are a horrifically fractured country - Brexit, covid, Scotland - any number of divisive issues and politicians accepting that people may hold different views without being evil, or scum, would be a good thing.
While I don’t disagree - division isn’t helpful. However, I notice that in this thread there are a lot of references to Rayner’s single mother status (and teenage mother). Why bring that up at all?
And thinking back by my reckoning Rayner would have her first child around 1996. In 1995 a notable future conservative politician wrote this about the children of single mothers “ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate”. John Redwood spat venom on them as soon as he got into cabinet. There was a drum beat of derision all coming from Conservative politicians (and future politicians) and the right wing media - most suggesting that she, or at least her situation, made her “scum.”
So she has given it back. Would I prefer that she and other politicians subject to those insults are able to rise above such slights. Of course. Do I understand why they bite back, again of course.
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
Well up to a point. But I'd say Tories will take a broader UK-wide view and I don't think Scotland will necessarily be representative. Clearly if they are fourth of fifth nationally that is bad news for them.
A friend of mine has an autistic 15 year old son. He's a lovely lad but weirdly keen on seeing the manager of his favourite football team sacked, even if they're doing rather better than they were a year ago or whenever he came in. If they're not in the top four of the Premiership he wants someone else to do the job. And his team are never going to be in the top four of the Premiership. They were in the old Division 1 once, but that was long ago. Those on the blue side calling for Kemi to be replaced remind me of that lad. Because I don't see who can do better. I don't think the Tories are ever going to be in government again in my lifetime. Kemi is in the sweetest spot they have; become more Jenricky and they lose voters to the Lib Dems; become more Cleverlyy and they lose voters to Reform. All thiose voters they lost to Reform: they're not Tories who'll come home, they never much liked the Tories in the first place but they voted for them because they were the most not-Labour. The only future I can see for them is hanging on grimly and hoping Reform collapse as and when Farage moves on.
I don't think that is true, Cleverly would at least shore up the 2024 Sunak vote and get more tactical votes from Labour and LDs in Tory seats to beat Reform than Kemi would.
He wouldn't win back most voters currently voting Reform but then neither it seems is Kemi.
Then as you say the next GE is key, if Reform and Farage win then the Tories will eventually merge into Reform anyway unless we get PR.
If Reform lose and the Tories lose though then I could see someone like JRM taking over as Tory leader ultimately and reuniting the right while post Farage Reform goes in a Lowe/Tommy Robinson hardline anti immigration, anti Islam direction that pushes it back down to 10% or so
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
Wishful thinking.
Kemi cutting through is not welcome apparently
The Tories doing worse than 2024 is not cut through.
You have a problem with Kemi, but what it is reflected in the polls is her improvement to the point her approval ratings are better than Farage and eclipse Starmer
The conservative vote share has marginally improved and there is time on her side
The other aspect of this that really concerns me is that another unnecessary leadership row only hands more gist to Reform and Farage
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Going to university doesn't make you clever, it just gives you qualifications. I have no objection to someone without a degree being PM. In fact I would welcome it. We massively overstate the importance of a degree*. However, I don't think Rayner is bright. Just ruthless. So while I'd welcome someone without a degree becoming PM, I wouldn't welcome Rayner specifically becoming PM.
*And don't come back to me with 'so you'd be happy with a doctor without a medical degree' - of course people need to get the proper training for the job they do. It just doesn't need to be in the form of a degree. There isn't a degree in 'running the country'. PPE or Classics or English Literature don't count.
She didn't even just fail to get a degree, she failed to even get GCSEs!
Might I politely suggest you get out an meet more people from outside your bubble. Having helped with the finances of a lot of working class/benefit scroungers (depending on your POV) you underestimate just how aspirational and ambitious they are. Their routes to financial wellbeing and becoming an established figure, in their locale, may be unconventional and illegal in some cases, but the drive is there.
Reform in many ways recognise that drive and make promises that resonate with them. It's just that those promises like many a politicians promises are somewhat detached from economic reality. But don't underestimate the drive the poor have.
So? Doesn't mean they should be PM.
John Major was very poor at one stage in his early childhood but still got qualifications and passed banking exams and had a professional career
Inside the Tories’ handling of the Mandelson saga:
✅LOTO + Whips playing a Commons blinder 😎‘We’re getting quite good at this opposition thing’ 📈And a shadow cabinet meeting on polling – Badenoch is leading the Party, like Cameron
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
That last question has an obvious question - Labour hadn’t been in power for 12 years so we’re not being blamed for any of the current problems.
The Tory party were in power two years ago so are being blamed for the current issues while Labour is just suffering from not fixing the issues.
Hence we are now into a period where both the Tories and Labour are not valid options so polling shows people going for anyone other than the parties who created the current mess
There is a psephological argument (though I think a superficial one) in favour of the Tories going centrist. However, I am interested in how its proponents explain the palpable lack of enthusiasm for the Lib Dems. They are of the progressive centre. They are not tainted as the Tories are by Government. They are not responsible for any of Starmer's cock ups either. They are identified with pro-Europeanism - a supposed golden ticket - more than any other party. So why are they causing such a massive collective shrug, and why should the Tories be so desperate to get a slice of that rather meagre pie?
One thing nobody in the media seems to be talking about is polling with alternative leaders.
Polling showed Labour would do much better with Burnham as leader instead of Starmer.
But polling showed they would do worse than Starmer with just about anybody else, and Rayner polled particularly poorly.
Is Labour really going to do a rerun of the Conservatives with Truss and elect someone who is even less popular than Starmer - and that's before they even start in the role.
If there were a single clear candidate for replacing Starmer, he'd already be on his way out the door. There isn't for now, and it's not impossible that he limps on, like the fatally damaged May, for another year or two.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
I am not saying there is not a problem. I am saying that the problem is poor financial understanding of the UK population, not that the company is being unreasonable. People who move to these places like them, but too few people want to make the move. And they are expensive because they offer premium things like subsidised restaurants, social activities, care, multiple lifts and 24hr site management.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
You can do degree apprenticeships too now products of which get well paid jobs
I've been saying for ages that Starmer is politically inept, he's smart enough for the job, and basically a decent man, but he's simply not cut out for leading a political party or a government. He walks into traps of his own making far too frequently.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married, though there are young single mothers who got good qualifications and even degrees
Fortunately, following traditional religious teaching stopped being important in our politicians last century.
It didn't to the likes of Rees Mogg, Widdecombe or even John McDonnell
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
Labour had opposition largely to itself then, Reform were nowhere.
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
I wished you bet (even a charity one) but accept that isn't the case.
I think you are mistaken; even if the Conservatives are behind Labour in the NEV, she will stay.
Inside the Tories’ handling of the Mandelson saga:
✅LOTO + Whips playing a Commons blinder 😎‘We’re getting quite good at this opposition thing’ 📈And a shadow cabinet meeting on polling – Badenoch is leading the Party, like Cameron
She is doing well only relative to the calibre of modern politicians, but that is probably enough. She ain't no Cameron though.
You can only judge her once her time as Conservative Leader is over. Cameron did a good job right up until he didn't (obviously, I think he did a great job, but all that effort to rehabilitate the Tory party led to the thing he and his fans didn't want).
Inside the Tories’ handling of the Mandelson saga:
✅LOTO + Whips playing a Commons blinder 😎‘We’re getting quite good at this opposition thing’ 📈And a shadow cabinet meeting on polling – Badenoch is leading the Party, like Cameron
She is doing well only relative to the calibre of modern politicians, but that is probably enough. She ain't no Cameron though.
You can only judge her once her time as Conservative Leader is over. Cameron did a good job right up until he didn't (obviously, I think he did a great job, but all that effort to rehabilitate the Tory party led to the thing he and his fans didn't want).
Cameron did a good job, probably more so as Conservative leader than PM, but a reasonably good job at both. His biggest error turned out pretty disastrously but that's the game, its unpredictable.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Laughable to suggest that Rayner hasn't worked hard.
Her upbringing was somewhat more difficult than Wes Streeting, whose dad played a significant role in his upbringing.
Rayners mum was illiterate & was bi-polar. Angela Rayner was by most accounts the primary carer for her mum and her 2 younger siblings from aged 10.
I know she's not everyones cup of tea.
Not sure why you are embarrassing yourself with this nonsense.
I admire her for reaching the places she has but I despair of her apparent hatred of 'the Tories'. Making politics too tribal does no-one any favours. We are a horrifically fractured country - Brexit, covid, Scotland - any number of divisive issues and politicians accepting that people may hold different views without being evil, or scum, would be a good thing.
While I don’t disagree - division isn’t helpful. However, I notice that in this thread there are a lot of references to Rayner’s single mother status (and teenage mother). Why bring that up at all?
And thinking back by my reckoning Rayner would have her first child around 1996. In 1995 a notable future conservative politician wrote this about the children of single mothers “ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate”. John Redwood spat venom on them as soon as he got into cabinet. There was a drum beat of derision all coming from Conservative politicians (and future politicians) and the right wing media - most suggesting that she, or at least her situation, made her “scum.”
So she has given it back. Would I prefer that she and other politicians subject to those insults are able to rise above such slights. Of course. Do I understand why they bite back, again of course.
A good, considered response, thanks! The differences of opinion around family life, single parenthood, the idea that young girls were getting pregnant to get a council house etc all seem a bit from the dark ages. Most people, I think, support the idea that kids need plenty of supportive adults around them when growing up. I was lucky enough to grow up in a family where mum and dad stayed married for over 50 years. Not everyone has that luxury. And oddly the 'have a baby' = 'get a council house' idea is gone now, as they've all gone to asylum seekers...
No-one should pretend that there isn't nastiness on both sides. (All sides?) I just take issue with the idea that the 'progressives' are sweetness and light.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
I think that's a bit unfair re: Oxbridge science.
It might be rather more theoretical than practical in some cases, but many of the facilities are world class and are definitely not disused parts of buildings.
I even got to weld something and mix concrete, albeit mostly for the lolz. There was admittely a lot more maths.
I'm more thinking about the British cultural idea of university, rather than the reality. I'm sure there are many universities doing very good work on technical and practical education that isn't book-focused, but it isn't flourishing because it isn't the idea that Britain has about university.
And no-one is willing to pay for it.
This. This. This.
We need to break down the wall between the managerial class - who are taught to despise domain knowledge and those who have the knowledge.
See the BritVolt discussions (in government and finance) where people are congratulating BritVolt on having proper generalists running it, rather than those ghastly technical oils.
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
Wishful thinking.
Kemi cutting through is not welcome apparently
The Tories doing worse than 2024 is not cut through.
You have a problem with Kemi, but what it is reflected in the polls is her improvement to the point her approval ratings are better than Farage and eclipse Starmer
The conservative vote share has marginally improved and there is time on her side
The other aspect of this that really concerns me is that another unnecessary leadership row only hands more gist to Reform and Farage
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
I am not saying there is not a problem. I am saying that the problem is poor financial understanding of the UK population, not that the company is being unreasonable. People who move to these places like them, but too few people want to make the move. And they are expensive because they offer premium things like subsidised restaurants, social activities, care, multiple lifts and 24hr site management.
Who should pay for those services?
The catch is the lowish upfront costs being balanced by usurious charges later on. Cough*PFI*cough.
Rayner's deprived upbringing is not dissimilar to that of JD Vance.
Both should be applauded for finding a way to progress upwards from a difficult start in life.
That doesn't mean though that you should necessarily want either to be in charge of their country.
Though it may be interesting to note people who condemn one of the pair for their background while praising the other for it.
JD Vance was a lawyer with a degree from Yale
It was the Marines that saved JD Vance according to himself in Hillbilly Elegy.
Vance's MOS (Military Occupational Specialty) was 4341 (Combat Correspondent, id est typist) that makes him a POG (Person Other than Grunt) and the much despised and lowest form of USMC life.
"Looks like the new lieutenant is too good to eat with the rest of us grunts!"
This is interesting commentary on the released files
Sure, I’ll explain. The emails released so far haven’t provided any prosecutorial evidence for a crime.
Yes, I KNOW what they say. And yes, I KNOW what they mean. But none of this is enough to convict in court.
And that’s BY DESIGN.
You need to understand *how* the Epstein prosecution actually worked to understand what these files are actually about.
When Epstein was re-arrested in 2019, he was recharged with his crimes from 2001-2006. All the *real* evidence collected was in pursuit of THOSE crimes… from 2001-2006.
All these 2009-2019 emails released thus far are like 80% bullshit. The other 20% is showcasing networks and showing us the bare minimum required by law.
Does that make them useless?
No. Most definitely NOT.
The average normie knows more about the elite circles that rule our world than they ever have. That’s serious progress.
But you also need to read this nonprosecution agreement and really absorb the implications. Alex Acosta et al gave immunity to Epstein and ALL his associates, both named AND unnamed.
Yes I know Ghislaine Maxwell was still prosecuted, but you have to understand that her case is literally headed all the way to the Supreme Court over THIS nonprosecution agreement.
Don’t expect anyone else to be charged until that’s litigated.
I'm not sure it's entirely true (I was under the impression that it was only four of Epstein's associates, still unidentified, who had been granted immunity under the Acosta deal), but it seems to me to be largely correct otherwise.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
There's been a few good news anecdotes on here about the NHS, so to balance things up I thought I'd share a story from my mother of a false economy leading to much greater cost.
"A resident here, Harry, went in to [an outer London] private hospital as an NHS patient for a hip replacement, sent home in a TAXI 2days after op, dumped in the carpark, I don't know how he got to his flat but the wound opened, he is now very ill in NHS hospital."
My mother has been recommended surgery to correct a case of Cavus foot that has developed as part of her Parkinson's, but recovery from surgery requires keeping weight off the foot for six weeks, so consensus among Parkinson sufferers is that the surgery is a ticket to requiring a wheelchair - at further expense for the NHS.
The NHS do seem overly focused on surgery as the cure for all ills, but then completely neglecting what happens afterwards.
I think, Mr LP, that your first case is a criticism of the private hospital, although also perhaps of the contracts manager in the NHS. When I worked in a private hospital, for a short time in the 80's, the surgeons always sent cases where there had been problems to the nearest NHS hospital.
With my Aunt, the lack of coordination between the various bits of the hospital (NHS) and the care teams outside was chronic.
Because I was down as next of kin, they started phoning me to ask what the other people were doing!
Having been on both sides of that particular fence I sympathise. Sometimes it doesn't work well; other times at all!
Everyone was well intentioned and hard working. The system wasn't letting them do their job.
I found myself sketching, in my head a web based* tool that would present, per patient, documentation, actions taken, actions to take, alerts, contacts in the various agencies that are part of the solution for that patient....
*So runs on everything - laptops, desktops, tablets and phones.
EDIT: It reminded me of an occasion when I saw a contractor for the road people trying to dig a hole with a shovel. No chance with that tool - he was hammering away, giving it his best, but...
You see so many things in hospitals and care settings where you can't help but think - give me a month or ten and I'll have that sorted.
The problem is that they work in silos and are forever running to catch up.
And some of those problems are because someone thought "give me a month or ten and I'll have that sorted", without thinking of the implementation challenges or broader interoperability issues! Although more of them are probably tight budgets.
No doubt, but you can't help think it.
A lot of of the systems seem to rely too much on ringing people up or passing paper around.
Locally, the worst of this seemed to be when trying to organise patient discharge.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
I am not saying there is not a problem. I am saying that the problem is poor financial understanding of the UK population, not that the company is being unreasonable. People who move to these places like them, but too few people want to make the move. And they are expensive because they offer premium things like subsidised restaurants, social activities, care, multiple lifts and 24hr site management.
Who should pay for those services?
The catch is the lowish upfront costs being balanced by usurious charges later on. Cough*PFI*cough.
I maintain they are not usurious! And they are explained clearly at time of purchase, at least to those bothered to pay attention.
You can't expect the amenities these places offer for the same service charge as a standard flat, or to sell them for the same price as a standard flat. That does not make them bad value or a con, just misunderstood.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
One doubts very much that the relative in question has actually tried giving it away.
I think Badenoch is doing a decent job. I’d vote for her to stop Farage certainly.
If they committed to doing something on university fees and the triple lock I think they’ve got my vote.
Do you mean reducing existing loans (such as you might have?) or future funding settlements for University? I think the triple lock needs to go. Something has to change.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
You can do degree apprenticeships too now products of which get well paid jobs
Age clearly impacts on my assessment
At age 16 in the 70s you were uni, white collar admin or blue collar
If you were lucky blue collar you got a good spprentiship in engineering, manufacturing or similar and a trade for life possibly some day release.
For too many their lives were dictated by a few hours in February of their 11th year.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Laughable to suggest that Rayner hasn't worked hard.
Her upbringing was somewhat more difficult than Wes Streeting, whose dad played a significant role in his upbringing.
Rayners mum was illiterate & was bi-polar. Angela Rayner was by most accounts the primary carer for her mum and her 2 younger siblings from aged 10.
I know she's not everyones cup of tea.
Not sure why you are embarrassing yourself with this nonsense.
I admire her for reaching the places she has but I despair of her apparent hatred of 'the Tories'. Making politics too tribal does no-one any favours. We are a horrifically fractured country - Brexit, covid, Scotland - any number of divisive issues and politicians accepting that people may hold different views without being evil, or scum, would be a good thing.
While I don’t disagree - division isn’t helpful. However, I notice that in this thread there are a lot of references to Rayner’s single mother status (and teenage mother). Why bring that up at all?
And thinking back by my reckoning Rayner would have her first child around 1996. In 1995 a notable future conservative politician wrote this about the children of single mothers “ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate”. John Redwood spat venom on them as soon as he got into cabinet. There was a drum beat of derision all coming from Conservative politicians (and future politicians) and the right wing media - most suggesting that she, or at least her situation, made her “scum.”
So she has given it back. Would I prefer that she and other politicians subject to those insults are able to rise above such slights. Of course. Do I understand why they bite back, again of course.
A good, considered response, thanks! The differences of opinion around family life, single parenthood, the idea that young girls were getting pregnant to get a council house etc all seem a bit from the dark ages. Most people, I think, support the idea that kids need plenty of supportive adults around them when growing up. I was lucky enough to grow up in a family where mum and dad stayed married for over 50 years. Not everyone has that luxury. And oddly the 'have a baby' = 'get a council house' idea is gone now, as they've all gone to asylum seekers...
No-one should pretend that there isn't nastiness on both sides. (All sides?) I just take issue with the idea that the 'progressives' are sweetness and light.
Thanks for response - I do disagree with the last comment of the first paragraph. Unless you are sarcastically referring to the latest bunch of people that we are supposed to hate.
Also I think anyone who has seen left wing politics up close would never suggest that they are “sweetness and light.” I do think the left can impugn unfair motives on folks with right wing views, and paint themselves as saints. Occasionally they are right, but mostly they are wrong. Ascribing motive on a mass of people (or even someone you haven’t met) is highly likely to be wrong - simpler just to go by what they say and do. However, I am sure we all do it and who can throw the first stone?
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’. https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Laughable to suggest that Rayner hasn't worked hard.
Her upbringing was somewhat more difficult than Wes Streeting, whose dad played a significant role in his upbringing.
Rayners mum was illiterate & was bi-polar. Angela Rayner was by most accounts the primary carer for her mum and her 2 younger siblings from aged 10.
I know she's not everyones cup of tea.
Not sure why you are embarrassing yourself with this nonsense.
I admire her for reaching the places she has but I despair of her apparent hatred of 'the Tories'. Making politics too tribal does no-one any favours. We are a horrifically fractured country - Brexit, covid, Scotland - any number of divisive issues and politicians accepting that people may hold different views without being evil, or scum, would be a good thing.
While I don’t disagree - division isn’t helpful. However, I notice that in this thread there are a lot of references to Rayner’s single mother status (and teenage mother). Why bring that up at all?
And thinking back by my reckoning Rayner would have her first child around 1996. In 1995 a notable future conservative politician wrote this about the children of single mothers “ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate”. John Redwood spat venom on them as soon as he got into cabinet. There was a drum beat of derision all coming from Conservative politicians (and future politicians) and the right wing media - most suggesting that she, or at least her situation, made her “scum.”
So she has given it back. Would I prefer that she and other politicians subject to those insults are able to rise above such slights. Of course. Do I understand why they bite back, again of course.
A good, considered response, thanks! The differences of opinion around family life, single parenthood, the idea that young girls were getting pregnant to get a council house etc all seem a bit from the dark ages. Most people, I think, support the idea that kids need plenty of supportive adults around them when growing up. I was lucky enough to grow up in a family where mum and dad stayed married for over 50 years. Not everyone has that luxury. And oddly the 'have a baby' = 'get a council house' idea is gone now, as they've all gone to asylum seekers...
No-one should pretend that there isn't nastiness on both sides. (All sides?) I just take issue with the idea that the 'progressives' are sweetness and light.
Thanks for response - I do disagree with the last comment of the first paragraph. Unless you are sarcastically referring to the latest bunch of people that we are supposed to hate.
Also I think anyone who has seen left wing politics up close would never suggest that they are “sweetness and light.” I do think the left can impugn unfair motives on folks with right wing views, and paint themselves as saints. Occasionally they are right, but mostly they are wrong. Ascribing motive on a mass of people (or even someone you haven’t met) is highly likely to be wrong - simpler just to go by what they say and do. However, I am sure we all do it and who can throw the first stone?
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
You can do degree apprenticeships too now products of which get well paid jobs
Age clearly impacts on my assessment
At age 16 in the 70s you were uni, white collar admin or blue collar
If you were lucky blue collar you got a good spprentiship in engineering, manufacturing or similar and a trade for life possibly some day release.
For too many their lives were dictated by a few hours in February of their 11th year.
Far more got into excellent academic state schools who were academic when we had grammar schools, pity we can't have a few more of them
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
Oh I know and I don't expect to inherit (although in the case of my M-i-L I do hope to recover the money i've paid to purchase a car / operations / teeth back).
Looking at the article the first flat seems to be a perfect example of not understanding that a £225,000 brand new flat has a new flat premium and was otherwise probably only worth £175,000 or so.
Which means they've seriously overpriced the flat, add on the fact 30% of the residents have now died off and you can see the problem. Were I buying I would be offering on a number of them and going how low can you go, lowest price gets the sale because it wouldn't surprise me if the real value of the flat is £75,000.
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
Labour had opposition largely to itself then, Reform were nowhere.
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
I wished you bet (even a charity one) but accept that isn't the case.
I think you are mistaken; even if the Conservatives are behind Labour in the NEV, she will stay.
She won't, if the Tories are third in May most Tory MPs will be panicking about their seats, there will be a VONC and she would lose it and be replaced by Cleverly.
May is make or break for Kemi, the Tories have to at least beat Labour on NEV for her to survive even if Reform still come top
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married, though there are young single mothers who got good qualifications and even degrees
Fortunately, following traditional religious teaching stopped being important in our politicians last century.
It didn't to the likes of [examples of politicians who reek of the last century, or in Rees Mogg's case, the 18th century]
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
Our former son in law and his sister paid over £250,000 in care fees for their mother and father
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
Our former son in law and his sister paid over £250,000 in care fees for their mother and father
Boris had the correct policy in the winning 2019 Tory manifesto, an £86000 cap on care costs with a NI social care levy to pay for it instead but the hapless Truss scrapped it
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
May tried that with her dementia tax in 2017, she lost her majority as a result at that election
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
Our former son in law and his sister paid over £250,000 in care fees for their mother and father
Boris had the correct policy, an £86000 cap on care costs with a NI social care levy to pay for it instead but the hapless Truss scrapped it
It was a huge sum and nobody should bank on their inheritance
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
Labour had opposition largely to itself then, Reform were nowhere.
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
I wished you bet (even a charity one) but accept that isn't the case.
I think you are mistaken; even if the Conservatives are behind Labour in the NEV, she will stay.
She won't, if the Tories are third in May most Tory MPs will be panicking about their seats, there will be a VONC and she would lose it and be replaced by Cleverly.
May is make or break for Kemi, the Tories have to at least beat Labour on NEV for her to survive even if Reform still come top
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
Labour had opposition largely to itself then, Reform were nowhere.
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
I wished you bet (even a charity one) but accept that isn't the case.
I think you are mistaken; even if the Conservatives are behind Labour in the NEV, she will stay.
She won't, if the Tories are third in May most Tory MPs will be panicking about their seats, there will be a VONC and she would lose it and be replaced by Cleverly.
May is make or break for Kemi, the Tories have to at least beat Labour on NEV for her to survive even if Reform still come top
No it is not
It is, if the Tories are 3rd on NEV in May then Kemi is done
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Going to university doesn't make you clever, it just gives you qualifications. I have no objection to someone without a degree being PM. In fact I would welcome it. We massively overstate the importance of a degree*. However, I don't think Rayner is bright. Just ruthless. So while I'd welcome someone without a degree becoming PM, I wouldn't welcome Rayner specifically becoming PM.
*And don't come back to me with 'so you'd be happy with a doctor without a medical degree' - of course people need to get the proper training for the job they do. It just doesn't need to be in the form of a degree. There isn't a degree in 'running the country'. PPE or Classics or English Literature don't count.
She didn't even just fail to get a degree, she failed to even get GCSEs!
Might I politely suggest you get out an meet more people from outside your bubble. Having helped with the finances of a lot of working class/benefit scroungers (depending on your POV) you underestimate just how aspirational and ambitious they are. Their routes to financial wellbeing and becoming an established figure, in their locale, may be unconventional and illegal in some cases, but the drive is there.
Reform in many ways recognise that drive and make promises that resonate with them. It's just that those promises like many a politicians promises are somewhat detached from economic reality. But don't underestimate the drive the poor have.
So? Doesn't mean they should be PM.
John Major was very poor at one stage in his early childhood but still got qualifications and passed banking exams and had a professional career
Ah. So some sort of entrance exam with credits towards it depending depending on the university college you attended. Perhaps adding in a bit of CPD. An interesting approach to democracy which I would support if the rules disqualified Nigel and his fellow travellers.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
Until I see a link to an auction with a £1 reserve price - the issue is the price they are expecting to receive for the flat.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
Many, many people expect to inherit from their elderly parents and are quite shocked when care costs rapidly diminish the savings etc. No-one has a right to inherit - if money needs to be spent to care for someone it should be spent. And these type housing set up are 'care'.
May tried that with her dementia tax in 2017, she lost her majority as a result at that election
Yes because people are fundamentally selfish. We need higher taxes on other people to pay for things for me.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
You can do degree apprenticeships too now products of which get well paid jobs
Age clearly impacts on my assessment
At age 16 in the 70s you were uni, white collar admin or blue collar
If you were lucky blue collar you got a good spprentiship in engineering, manufacturing or similar and a trade for life possibly some day release.
For too many their lives were dictated by a few hours in February of their 11th year.
Far more got into excellent academic state schools who were academic when we had grammar schools, pity we can't have a few more of them
I agree
I went to a Grammar School covenanted in the 16th Century by King Edward VI...
In my 3rd form year it was announced that there would be no new entrants in 2 years time as it was being abolished and turned in to a 6th form college.
My first year in 6th form was at my old school new college..
A shocking waste a tragic error.
I'll allow you to guess which Minister of Education made that decision?
My Headmaster a noted Latin scholar and author told 650 boys that if said Minister came to the school he would probably be arrested.
In many ways it defined my politcal direction of travel the sheer impact that decision did to the school, the separate Girls High, the town and the surrounding area.
The culling and wilful attack on some outstanding grammar and secondary schools.
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’. https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
Nigel needs to tell us precisely what these American values are that he's so keen to spread over here and how he intends to spread them. This is not a trivial point. Democratically, we all have the right to know his agenda in full and without obfuscation.
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
They are bad, but she certainly won't be ditched. I don't think there is any appetite for that at all. She is proving to be a competent and feisty opposition leader (at last), and the Tories simply have to play the long game. We are still perambulating along Protest Street.
One thing that she has lost is the Jenrick firewall.
If the results are as bad as feared, the the May results will show over half of Tory MPs losing their seats.
The other thing that is focussing minds if this is the worst government ever, why are the Tories doing so badly, Labour led by 33% during the Truss premiership.
Labour had opposition largely to itself then, Reform were nowhere.
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
I wished you bet (even a charity one) but accept that isn't the case.
I think you are mistaken; even if the Conservatives are behind Labour in the NEV, she will stay.
She won't, if the Tories are third in May most Tory MPs will be panicking about their seats, there will be a VONC and she would lose it and be replaced by Cleverly.
May is make or break for Kemi, the Tories have to at least beat Labour on NEV for her to survive even if Reform still come top
No it is not
It is, if the Tories are 3rd on NEV in May then Kemi is done
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’. https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
Inside the Tories’ handling of the Mandelson saga:
✅LOTO + Whips playing a Commons blinder 😎‘We’re getting quite good at this opposition thing’ 📈And a shadow cabinet meeting on polling – Badenoch is leading the Party, like Cameron
I'm not being funny, and maybe in today's fractured politics it's relatively good, but on an absolute basis those numbers are not good, they are terrible.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
You can do degree apprenticeships too now products of which get well paid jobs
Indeed, and it would be good if there were rather more of them. But it's much harder to get a degree apprenticeship than it is to get onto an undergraduate course, even at quite a high-ranking university.
I think Badenoch is doing a decent job. I’d vote for her to stop Farage certainly.
If they committed to doing something on university fees and the triple lock I think they’ve got my vote.
Triple Lock yes.
Uni fees is being pushed by hacks who have buyers remorse. Like the WASPI women they have picked the least sympathetic people to push the campaign.
What should they do ? Just wipe the slate clean ?
You cannot expect people on min wage working in call centres and supermarkets to pay taxes to fund kids going to Uni to get degrees which won’t enhance their life prospects.
Personally I would fund degrees like STEM and Engineering and offer, as part of the negotiations with the Junior Doctors some debt forgiveness in return for them committing to rNHS.
As for the rest. Let the UNIs charge what they want and let them be responsible for collecting any fees owed.
Can't sell the flat for what he thinks he should get is the real issue. There is a price at which someone will buy, but it is probably a lot lower than he thought he was going to inherit.
Economics 101. Back in the real world, the story tells us buyers must be over 70 and pay £11,000 a year in service charges. What does that Venn diagram look like?
So no-one would buy for one pound?
Well, first, they'd have to live in the area already to know it was for sale; then they would need to be over 70, unable to afford a normally-priced flat, yet still able to pay £11,000 a year in service charges. So what's the Venn diagram?
And that ignores that your reductio ad absurdum would repel buyers because at that price there *must* be something wrong.
There is a lack of financial education and understanding here all round. £11k a year for that kind of property isn't ridiculous, including council tax (£1k), and weekly home care (worth approx £1.5k?). Having an on site hub and restaurant radically transforms the social life of the residents for the better. Care is also easier to access. If they are downsizing then being able to comfortably pay 10-15 years service charge towards end of life is not going to be particularly unusual.
86% of residents are happy - this is a good place to live, far more suitable for someone with declining health and mobility than trying to maintain a 3/4 bed family home on their own.
But it goes against the mindset of the UK property owning obsessions, service charges are as seen as rent which is seen as dead money. Capital must be preserved to pass down the generations even if that means poorer quality of life for those who have accumulated the capital.
That's not the issue.
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests): ..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019. A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away". Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
I am not saying there is not a problem. I am saying that the problem is poor financial understanding of the UK population, not that the company is being unreasonable. People who move to these places like them, but too few people want to make the move. And they are expensive because they offer premium things like subsidised restaurants, social activities, care, multiple lifts and 24hr site management.
Who should pay for those services?
The catch is the lowish upfront costs being balanced by usurious charges later on. Cough*PFI*cough.
Caveat scriptor is the test and not whether they can count, or indeed have the money to pay. See 2008 and derivatives.
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
I would just say so what
You seem to think the only way to succeed is to go to University which is nonsense
Indeed, maybe we would be better with street wise, practical and honest people, then some of those governing us
I went to Uni and im useless
My issue with @HYUFD is he seems to think the only way to success is to go to University which is obviously silly
Angela Rayner has a formidable back story and to say she shouldn't have got pregnant at 16 is out of order
Indeed the 50% University policy of Blair was wrong and it is good to see the change to a more sensible mix with FEs
No, Winston Churchill did not go to university, nor did Disraeli, nor did Major nor did Lloyd George. All became PM but they all got more qualifications at school than Rayner did.
If you followed traditional religious teaching you wouldn't get pregnant until married
Who is the clever person
The University Graduate who learns what is required to pass exams and often doesnt enter a work environment until 22 or later, often drops in to a mid level role or
Someone with or without qualifications who enters work at 16, learns skills either white or blue collar, builds a career of understanding and knowledge and almost certainly a greater appreciation of real life.
BTW there is no right answer.
Those who think there is a right answer are IMHO the ones who are wrong.
It's a false dichotomy.
My brother-in-law here in Ireland is a welder. A blue collar occupation. So by your argument he would have left school at 16, gone straight into work, learned his trade that way, etc.
But he has had a technically-focused third level education. He's a graduate. Very highly skilled and good at what he does and well-paid for it.
The problem in Britain is that we have an idea of University that it is Oxbridge. It is a Classical education of the Trivium. All books in ancient libraries. Even the practical sciences are a bit of an oddity, more eccentrics in disused parts of buildings, rather than the core focus of the institution.
There's no room for a welder receiving an appropriate third-level education at a British University.
And so that's why British rates of graduate education are lower than its peers, and yet the debate in Britain is focused on making it lower still, and so the British economy lacks the skills to succeed, imports migrants to fill the gaps, and the culture is anti-education. It's so self-harming.
You can do degree apprenticeships too now products of which get well paid jobs
Indeed, and it would be good if there were rather more of them. But it's much harder to get a degree apprenticeship than it is to get onto an undergraduate course, even at quite a high-ranking university.
I joined Edinburgh City Police in 1964 by taking their exam in their police station by St Giles
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’. https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
I never ceased to be amazed at the uncanny knack of the political class to find people who share their views so they can use it as confirmation.
Scottish Westminster Figures with MiC are very tasty
SNP 28 Ref 23 Lab 20 LD 12 Con 11 Grn 5
This is the sort of stuff that’s going to see the Tories ditch Kemi in May.
Wishful thinking.
Kemi cutting through is not welcome apparently
The Tories doing worse than 2024 is not cut through.
You have a problem with Kemi, but what it is reflected in the polls is her improvement to the point her approval ratings are better than Farage and eclipse Starmer
The conservative vote share has marginally improved and there is time on her side
The other aspect of this that really concerns me is that another unnecessary leadership row only hands more gist to Reform and Farage
Kemi, is that you?
Is that the best you can do ?
Yeah, we shouldn’t get down to name calling amongst ourselves, a political party is about its distinct policy and ideology, and at the end of the day, how persuasively we explained ourselves from the top the soap box to build a big tent.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
Nonetheless it is clear evidence that amongst voters as a whole (including the tactical voters Tory MPs will need in their seats to hold off Reform) Cleverly is more popular than Kemi.
Think long and hard maybe but if the Tories are THIRD in May behind even a massively unpopular Starmer Labour party not just Reform then I am afraid the Tories are done under Kemi anyway. Tory MPs would feel they had no choice but to remove her.
It is up to Kemi, if the Tories get second in May she will survive but that is a minimum for her to continue
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
I never ceased to be amazed at the uncanny knack of the political class to find people who share their views so they can use it as confirmation.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
Penny wasn’t an option and Cleverly was too clever by half and knocked himself out of contention
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
Nonetheless it is clear evidence that amongst voters as a whole (including the tactical voters Tory MPs will need in their seats to hold off Reform) Cleverly is more popular than Kemi.
Think long and hard maybe but if the Tories are THIRD in May behind even a massively unpopular Starmer Labour party not just Reform then I am afraid the Tories are done under Kemi anyway. Tory MPs would feel they had no choice but to remove her.
It is up to Kemi, if the Tories get second in May she will survive but that is a minimum for her to continue
There’s really no question to which Angela Rayner is the answer.
If she can’t run her own household without getting into financial trouble, what chance her running the country?
Can we imagine her turning up to a meeting with Trump or Xi, and be taken remotely seriously?
Her household was in financial trouble when she was born, because she grew up in poverty being raised by her grandma and left school at 16 without any qualifications.
I like the idea of a PM with an authentic working class background who has overcome extreme adversity to get to the top. Any foreign leader worth their salt would take seriously someone who has, although some are obviously not worth their salt. I wouldn't blame her for looking down on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, like Trump.
Had she got to Oxbridge from that background or made herself a self made millionaire you might have a point but otherwise there are millions of single mother's raised on council estates who left school with no qualifications and maybe got a middle class office job with a bit of hard work. It doesn't mean they should be PM!
Rayner would be a better campaigner than Starmer no doubt and she she would rally the left more behind her as Corbyn did but she would turn off centrist swing voters and in terms of actual competence for the job Starmer would be better. Sir Keir was himself raised in a relatively working class household and through sheer hard work did manage to get to university and an Oxford postgrad degree and the bar and KC and on that basis if it were a choice between Rayner or keeping Starmer I would keep him
So your view is that she should know her place and stay there.
She has no degree and got no qualifications to speak of at school, effectively Rayner still is working class, just one who knows how to navigate a path to the top of the Labour party.
Starmer for all his faults actually did take himself from the skilled working class to the upper middle class by sheer hard work. Streeting too was working class by background, with relatives in prison and son of a single mother in a council flat who also got himself to Cambridge and the upper middle class by hard work
Laughable to suggest that Rayner hasn't worked hard.
Her upbringing was somewhat more difficult than Wes Streeting, whose dad played a significant role in his upbringing.
Rayners mum was illiterate & was bi-polar. Angela Rayner was by most accounts the primary carer for her mum and her 2 younger siblings from aged 10.
I know she's not everyones cup of tea.
Not sure why you are embarrassing yourself with this nonsense.
I admire her for reaching the places she has but I despair of her apparent hatred of 'the Tories'. Making politics too tribal does no-one any favours. We are a horrifically fractured country - Brexit, covid, Scotland - any number of divisive issues and politicians accepting that people may hold different views without being evil, or scum, would be a good thing.
Look at HYFUD's attitude towards her and his lack of shyness in expressing it on here if you want to understand this apparent hatred of 'the Tories'.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
Penny Mordaunt. Only hampered by the fact she wasn't an MP therefore ineligible.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
She is the best of the options the Tories have but common sense doesn’t occur when people start panicking and post May’s local election a lot of MPs will be panicking
Was just doing a search on PB for an old comment and it was extraordinary how many posters came up in the search who no longer post or have been banned. A really good range of positions too. A shame.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
Nonetheless it is clear evidence that amongst voters as a whole (including the tactical voters Tory MPs will need in their seats to hold off Reform) Cleverly is more popular than Kemi.
Think long and hard maybe but if the Tories are THIRD in May behind even a massively unpopular Starmer Labour party not just Reform then I am afraid the Tories are done under Kemi anyway. Tory MPs would feel they had no choice but to remove her.
It is up to Kemi, if the Tories get second in May she will survive but that is a minimum for her to continue
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
Interesting, an Ipsos poll last year though had Boris clear favourite amongst 2024 Tory voters to return as leader if Kemi went, then Cleverly second and a returned Rishi third. Hunt was 5th after Tugendhat. Boris is ineligible though as not an MP so Cleverly is by default favourite with Tory voters now.
2024 Reform voters preferred Jenrick, then Boris second, then Braverman third, so BobbyJ and Suella found their natural home in the end
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
I never ceased to be amazed at the uncanny knack of the political class to find people who share their views so they can use it as confirmation.
Whilst I enjoy talking politics online, I generally dislike it in real life, especially with people I don't know. So faced with a partisan bore my options are try and switch the subject, leave or quietly pretend to agree. I suspect quite a few take a similar approach which leads to some of that confirmation bias. Then the partisan bores exaggerate the level of confirmation further.
Put me in "surprised, but not shocked", and I don't even know the area.
1 Not many stories tip that many votes by themselves. (The main effect of Mandygate is likely to be more enthusiasm for anti-government parties and less for Labour than many actual switches.) I doubt that many people ever knew who Nathan Gill was, unfortunately.
2 There are always local factors, and they often swamp the national signal.
Taking the national pulse from any one local by-election is almost as silly as using FON.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
Nonetheless it is clear evidence that amongst voters as a whole (including the tactical voters Tory MPs will need in their seats to hold off Reform) Cleverly is more popular than Kemi.
Think long and hard maybe but if the Tories are THIRD in May behind even a massively unpopular Starmer Labour party not just Reform then I am afraid the Tories are done under Kemi anyway. Tory MPs would feel they had no choice but to remove her.
It is up to Kemi, if the Tories get second in May she will survive but that is a minimum for her to continue
Re your first paragraph where is your evidence ?
If you had bothered to read it I just posted it earlier!!!
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’. https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
Cleverly had double the support Kemi did amongst all voters in this poll during the 2024 Tory leadership election for example and also led her amongst Tory voters, though Reform voters were tied as to whether they preferred Kemi or Cleverly
69% expressed no preference/don’t know, in a poll taken over a year ago. I see little in that polling that suggests the general public have much of an impression of any of the Tory frontbench, let alone a clear picture on where any of them land on the political spectrum.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
Can’t be easy for Kemi moving into both leadership role and HMLOTO role not much more than a year ago, should appreciate it takes a while to learn on the job, and that’s two jobs new to her.
I don’t expect a move against learning, trying hard and improving Kemi this year, regardless how bad the May elections are.
But her policies are shit. Kemi and her wonks get their ideas from immersing their heads in social media echo chambers, that has Conservative in the titles, but arn’t Conservative.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
Penny wasn’t an option and Cleverly was too clever by half and knocked himself out of contention
I believe they were talking generally and more specifically of recent Tory Leadership Elections and leading Tory politicians
Notwithstanding the fact Badenoch is not someone they appear to see as an asset in any way.
No picture of her in the Club. Says a lot.
Sunak, Boris, May, Cameron had pics. Don't think they got a lettuce framed in time for Truss.
Was just doing a search on PB for an old comment and it was extraordinary how many posters came up in the search who no longer post or have been banned. A really good range of positions too. A shame.
It is perhaps more surprising the number of people who persist. Maybe their first 80,000 post haven't changed a single persons view of Brexit, but who knows if the 80,001st post just might suddenly enlighten their opponents.
I have yet to see a convincing argument that yet more Tory bloodletting and the sixth leadership change in ten years will do anything to improve the party’s fortunes. People do appreciate that the Tories got so destroyed in 2024 because people stopped taking them seriously, yes?
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
Well he is more likely to hold the 2024 Sunak vote and also more likely to get Labour and LD tactical votes in Tory held seats v Reform than Kemi is
What is your evidence for that, please?
I play snooker occasionally at the local Conservative Club. Now it is true that I have to hold my nose and promise to behave.
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
Interesting, an Ipsos poll last year though had Boris clear favourite amongst 2024 Tory voters to return as leader if Kemi went, then Cleverly second and a returned Rishi third. Hunt was 5th after Tugendhat. Boris is ineligible though as not an MP so Cleverly is by default favourite with Tory voters now.
2024 Reform voters preferred Jenrick, then Boris second, then Braverman third, so BobbyJ and Suella found their natural home in the end
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’. https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
What is there to discuss?
Apart from what the UK is going to do about it?
Bannon, of course, is neck deep in the Epstein files.
You really do start to question the boundary commissions judgement in creating Gorton and Denton - obviously all seats have some variation in them but in this case there are two wildly different sections that are looking for different things from an MP.
Comments
Kemi's target is to come second in May in the local and devolved elections behind Reform and the Tories ahead of Labour on NEV, if she does that she will be secure.
If the Tories come third behind Reform and Labour though then likely she will be replaced by Cleverly
And thinking back by my reckoning Rayner would have her first child around 1996. In 1995 a notable future conservative politician wrote this about the children of single mothers “ill-raised, ignorant, aggressive and illegitimate”. John Redwood spat venom on them as soon as he got into cabinet. There was a drum beat of derision all coming from Conservative politicians (and future politicians) and the right wing media - most suggesting that she, or at least her situation, made her “scum.”
So she has given it back. Would I prefer that she and other politicians subject to those insults are able to rise above such slights. Of course. Do I understand why they bite back, again of course.
He wouldn't win back most voters currently voting Reform but then neither it seems is Kemi.
Then as you say the next GE is key, if Reform and Farage win then the Tories will eventually merge into Reform anyway unless we get PR.
If Reform lose and the Tories lose though then I could see someone like JRM taking over as Tory leader ultimately and reuniting the right while post Farage Reform goes in a Lowe/Tommy Robinson hardline anti immigration, anti Islam direction that pushes it back down to 10% or so
The point is the restrictive covenants *on the empty properties* which can make the properties impossible even to give away (as the article suggests):
..One property we found had been vacant for more than nine years. In another case, family members face £60,000 in charges accrued since the property became vacant in 2019.
A relative told us it was "like a noose around our necks", and another expressed frustration that "you can't give them away".
Another beneficiary reported paying service charges of £750 per month on a flat that has been empty for four years, describing it as a "never-ending nightmare", adding: "It is infuriating and heartbreaking in equal measure."..
From the reporting on this, it really does not sound as though the inability to sell is entirely down to unrealistic expectations of value.
https://x.com/J_Bardella/status/2019715291261915209
John Major was very poor at one stage in his early childhood but still got qualifications and passed banking exams and had a professional career
The Tory party were in power two years ago so are being blamed for the current issues while Labour is just suffering from not fixing the issues.
Hence we are now into a period where both the Tories and Labour are not valid options so polling shows people going for anyone other than the parties who created the current mess
There isn't for now, and it's not impossible that he limps on, like the fatally damaged May, for another year or two.
Who should pay for those services?
I think you are mistaken; even if the Conservatives are behind Labour in the NEV, she will stay.
No-one should pretend that there isn't nastiness on both sides. (All sides?) I just take issue with the idea that the 'progressives' are sweetness and light.
"Intellectuals" as Natural Luddites
If they committed to doing something on university fees and the triple lock I think they’ve got my vote.
Cough*PFI*cough.
Kemi needs to do more for young people
Sure, I’ll explain. The emails released so far haven’t provided any prosecutorial evidence for a crime.
Yes, I KNOW what they say. And yes, I KNOW what they mean. But none of this is enough to convict in court.
And that’s BY DESIGN.
You need to understand *how* the Epstein prosecution actually worked to understand what these files are actually about.
When Epstein was re-arrested in 2019, he was recharged with his crimes from 2001-2006. All the *real* evidence collected was in pursuit of THOSE crimes… from 2001-2006.
All these 2009-2019 emails released thus far are like 80% bullshit. The other 20% is showcasing networks and showing us the bare minimum required by law.
Does that make them useless?
No. Most definitely NOT.
The average normie knows more about the elite circles that rule our world than they ever have. That’s serious progress.
But you also need to read this nonprosecution agreement and really absorb the implications. Alex Acosta et al gave immunity to Epstein and ALL his associates, both named AND unnamed.
Yes I know Ghislaine Maxwell was still prosecuted, but you have to understand that her case is literally headed all the way to the Supreme Court over THIS nonprosecution agreement.
Don’t expect anyone else to be charged until that’s litigated.
Until then, keep on the pressure and use the court of public opinion to shame those who have yet to be held accountable.
https://x.com/Villgecrazylady/status/2019605355567657427
I'm not sure it's entirely true (I was under the impression that it was only four of Epstein's associates, still unidentified, who had been granted immunity under the Acosta deal), but it seems to me to be largely correct otherwise.
My expectation is that there is a lot of sunk cost fallacy involved here if you are paying £750 a month - and hoping for £60,000 - 1 year later and £9,000 down you now need that £60,000 to offset the £9,000 costs
A lot of of the systems seem to rely too much on ringing people up or passing paper around.
Locally, the worst of this seemed to be when trying to organise patient discharge.
You can't expect the amenities these places offer for the same service charge as a standard flat, or to sell them for the same price as a standard flat. That does not make them bad value or a con, just misunderstood.
At age 16 in the 70s you were uni, white collar admin or blue collar
If you were lucky blue collar you got a good spprentiship in engineering, manufacturing or similar and a trade for life possibly some day release.
For too many their lives were dictated by a few hours in February of their 11th year.
Also I think anyone who has seen left wing politics up close would never suggest that they are “sweetness and light.” I do think the left can impugn unfair motives on folks with right wing views, and paint themselves as saints. Occasionally they are right, but mostly they are wrong. Ascribing motive on a mass of people (or even someone you haven’t met) is highly likely to be wrong - simpler just to go by what they say and do. However, I am sure we all do it and who can throw the first stone?
2026 - US taxpayers foot the bill for an influence campaign involving what a Reform insider describes as a “slush fund” just weeks before the UK’s local elections.
https://x.com/AlexanderPHRose/status/2019644353950462374
Senior state department official Sarah Rogers travelled to European cities in December and has spoken to key figures in Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party about deploying grants to spread ‘American values’.
https://ft.trib.al/O4ss54T
Trump's US is a hostile power, and Farage is a traitor; discuss.
Looking at the article the first flat seems to be a perfect example of not understanding that a £225,000 brand new flat has a new flat premium and was otherwise probably only worth £175,000 or so.
Which means they've seriously overpriced the flat, add on the fact 30% of the residents have now died off and you can see the problem. Were I buying I would be offering on a number of them and going how low can you go, lowest price gets the sale because it wouldn't surprise me if the real value of the flat is £75,000.
May is make or break for Kemi, the Tories have to at least beat Labour on NEV for her to survive even if Reform still come top
Up against a populist but chaotic Reform offering and a disappointing chaotic Labour offering the only viable road for the Tories is the long game and stability. A sensible economic prospectus with a bit of red meat thrown in. That’s broadly the contours that Badenoch is sketching out - that’s not necessarily a recipe for landslide majority government but it’s a chance to keep the party viable. Maybe even largest party if the dice fall right (much will depend on what happens to Reform in the next three years).
I have no idea what James Cleverly is designed to offer as an alternative?
But I am going to be disappointed, I know.
I went to a Grammar School covenanted in the 16th Century by King Edward VI...
In my 3rd form year it was announced that there would be no new entrants in 2 years time as it was being abolished and turned in to a 6th form college.
My first year in 6th form was at my old school new college..
A shocking waste a tragic error.
I'll allow you to guess which Minister of Education made that decision?
My Headmaster a noted Latin scholar and author told 650 boys that if said Minister came to the school he would probably be arrested.
In many ways it defined my politcal direction of travel the sheer impact that decision did to the school, the separate Girls High, the town and the surrounding area.
The culling and wilful attack on some outstanding grammar and secondary schools.
https://bmgresearch.com/news/conservative-leadership-polling-2024/
23, 19, 18, 19, 18, 19, 20, 21, 19, 19, 20, 21, 21, 20, 18, 18, 17, 20, 17, 19, 17, 20, 17, 22, 20, 18, 18
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_next_United_Kingdom_general_election
I'm not being funny, and maybe in today's fractured politics it's relatively good, but on an absolute basis those numbers are not good, they are terrible.
Uni fees is being pushed by hacks who have buyers remorse. Like the WASPI women they have picked the least sympathetic people to push the campaign.
What should they do ? Just wipe the slate clean ?
You cannot expect people on min wage working in call centres and supermarkets to pay taxes to fund kids going to Uni to get degrees which won’t enhance their life prospects.
Personally I would fund degrees like STEM and Engineering and offer, as part of the negotiations with the Junior Doctors some debt forgiveness in return for them committing to rNHS.
As for the rest. Let the UNIs charge what they want and let them be responsible for collecting any fees owed.
@Sandpit @williamglenn and anyone else I have missed, please explain.
None of us recruited that day needed a degree
Apart from what the UK is going to do about it?
It is though very interesting to listen to local long standing Members.
Very few have a good word to say about Kemi. The few that have met her talk of her rudeness and arrogance.
They would very much have preferred Penny Mordaunt to have been elected Leader followed by Cleverly.
The overwhelming favourite though had he have stood would have been Jeremy Hunt. The other local favourite is Johnny Mercer
With a new LD MP and several Tory Councillors having defected to Reform and also more actually to fight on their personal record as independents, the mood is very downbeat and none see Kemi as a PM or long term Tory Leader.
I do appreciate your long held view HYUFD re the position Badenoch will find herself in, in May. You have long said she will go if she doesn’t get second in NEV. But as a counterpoint I am saying that the party needs to think long and hard about panicking into another leadership change, especially given the chaos engulfing Labour right now, and given that Badenoch, whilst still presiding over bad VI polling, is at least starting to make a name for herself and improve her personal ratings.
Last night's Ynys Mon result was astonishing for Reform
Absolutely no Nathan Gill effect
I really am surprised
https://x.com/i/status/2019571141053149318
Think long and hard maybe but if the Tories are THIRD in May behind even a massively unpopular Starmer Labour party not just Reform then I am afraid the Tories are done under Kemi anyway. Tory MPs would feel they had no choice but to remove her.
It is up to Kemi, if the Tories get second in May she will survive but that is a minimum for her to continue
Sotv
Kro
Only hampered by the fact she wasn't an MP therefore ineligible.
2024 Reform voters preferred Jenrick, then Boris second, then Braverman third, so BobbyJ and Suella found their natural home in the end
https://conservativehome.com/2025/08/07/the-return-of-boris-tory-voters-are-looking-back-to-the-future/
1 Not many stories tip that many votes by themselves. (The main effect of Mandygate is likely to be more enthusiasm for anti-government parties and less for Labour than many actual switches.) I doubt that many people ever knew who Nathan Gill was, unfortunately.
2 There are always local factors, and they often swamp the national signal.
Taking the national pulse from any one local by-election is almost as silly as using FON.
https://bmgresearch.com/news/conservative-leadership-polling-2024/
I don’t expect a move against learning, trying hard and improving Kemi this year, regardless how bad the May elections are.
But her policies are shit. Kemi and her wonks get their ideas from immersing their heads in social media echo chambers, that has Conservative in the titles, but arn’t Conservative.
Notwithstanding the fact Badenoch is not someone they appear to see as an asset in any way.
No picture of her in the Club. Says a lot.
Sunak, Boris, May, Cameron had pics. Don't think they got a lettuce framed in time for Truss.
Are you for real
Explain why Kemi is now more popular than Farage and miles ahead of Starmer
NEW: Lord Mandelson took advice from Jeffrey Epstein on government policy while Epstein was in jail for soliciting prostitution...
https://x.com/ProducerOllie/status/2019754366337429742?s=20
We can't have Trump/ Putin adjacent fascists running our country.
https://x.com/LukeTryl/status/2019738650406256905
You really do start to question the boundary commissions judgement in creating Gorton and Denton - obviously all seats have some variation in them but in this case there are two wildly different sections that are looking for different things from an MP.