"Data gathered by the global business insurer QBE via freedom of information requests reveals that fire brigades were called to 1,760 fires linked to lithium-ion batteries in 2025, equating to 4.8 fires a day, an increase of 147% over the past three years.
Electric vehicle fires rose by 133% over the same period, while the number of electric vehicles on UK roads tripled during that time.
QBE researchers found that ebike fires made up nearly a third of all lithium-ion battery fires nationally and noted that retrofitted and converted ebikes appeared to be disproportionately involved compared with certified models.
There were 520 callouts to fires involving ebikes in 2025, compared with 149 in 2022. London fire brigade (LFB) tackled 44% of these, with 230 ebike fires occurring in the capital last year and five related fatalities in the past three years."
It’s the Chinese kits, cheaply ordered online and often mislabeled, that are the problem. Customs need to be better at finding them, and trading standards need to be more proactive in policing bike shops reselling and fitting them. No, your electric Brompton isn’t going to ‘go on fire’.
I do wonder how well the Chinese cars are crash-tested, and if what arrives on the boat is then representative of what was certified. As with bikes, a Western-brand car is unlikely to catch fire in regular use, as opposed to after a major accident.
The EVs have about 10% of the rate of fires as fossil fuel vehicles, but they are typically far more serious incidents.
For "bikes" and similar, it is as noted down to a political decision not to regulate the marketplace for safety, unlike powertools, laptops, kettles and the rest.
This one is a really serious issue now that Insurance Companies and insurance companies are running ignorant, panicked and scared and clamping down on everything from a base of ignorance. Here is an example case that has been fought this year.
TLDR: Masters student at a Russell Group Uni had her power wheelchair attachment, which is fully certified and allowed on aeroplanes and costs about £3-4k, compulsorily stored in a security guard controlled 'shed' rather than her accommodation.
She could only access it by going to the accommodation, with a wait of 10-20 minutes. And when that was unstaffed it was a phone call to when security were on duty, and and even longer wait as it needed an elaborate explanation. How would we feel if forced to access our outdoor shoes on those terms?
By the time they checked with a real fire expert, her social life had been wrecked, the battery was damaged by the conditions and needed replacing (cost: £500), extra self-propelling had exacerbated shoulder injuries so basic tasks like opening doors became difficult, and more.
But the institution did not get any of it, even afterwards, even after they had acted on an assumed non-existent risk that they did not bother to find out about.
It is very difficult to enforce action on, which should have been able to be done the same day. But the enforcement mechanisms in the Equality Act were gutted in 2011, and now the bastards want to repeal the whole thing because they have a couple of bees in their bonnet.
I prefer to remember him as a distinguished Shakespearean actor. I saw him as Mark Antony in Antony and Cleopatra in Chichester playing opposite Kim Cattrall.
That would have been good.
The A&C I saw back in the day were Vanessa Redgrave and Timothy Dalton who, I believe, were actually a pair.
UPDATE: Catherine West says she accidentally called for a leadership election "in September" in her email to Labour MPs
She meant a new leader should be in place by September, but wants the contest to begin "soon"
Man these people make the Tories look like the model of competence.
I seriously don't understand how anyone can take them seriously. The leader has a pretty poor relaunch speech, the noname challenger says it's not enough, then sends out an email saying actually no it's fine we'll wait until September and give Burnham a chance to get into parliament, now saying wait no I meant soon.
Wtf is she playing at, Labour already look completely incompetent and she's making things 10x worse. One or all of the potential runners needs to tell her to stfu and let them organise a coup.
So West clearly lacked the MPs to nominate her, Starmer is safe for another year. Streeting knows he doesn't need to challenge him while Burnham is out of the Commons as he is heir apparent until then
No he isn't.
This isn't over by a long way.
This has, in essence, only just started.
We have the rest of the Mandelson papers to come. Plus much more
Mandelson was closer to Streeting if anything than Starmer
In fact Streeting claims "yes, I knew Starmer, but only in passing. I mean, I never actually spoke to the bloke."
How far have you fallen, when your own MPs claim to be closer to Mandelson than you?
Little discussed is the number of places where two Party coalitions are almost impossible. Birmingham is a shining example, but there are plenty more. Looks like Labour are putting Reform in to bat but with no prospect of an opportunity to assemble enough for control.
As an aside, I was out socially last night and one of the defeated Havering Conservative councillors was there so I made some polite comment to which the response was "Rosindell's a scumbag" and I had to restrain myself from replying "you've only found out now?"
Lisa Nandy was on WATO and she sounded so down that the interviewer asked her about it. She admitted that they had lost 25 out of 25 seats in Wigan and she was "reeling". The full scale of Thursday's disaster for Labour is still sinking in. Pretty much every MP where there were elections will know councillors, MSPs or AMs who lost their seats. Its quite hard not to conclude that they cannot go on like this.
Nearly as bad. I fear that geniuses will be doubling down on how to win back Reform voters.
“We have to face up to the fact every single one of them is fucking useless. Andy’s strategy has been a disaster. Angela has bottled it. Ed clearly a hiding to nothing. Wes is AWOL. God knows what Catherine West is doing. I am not quite sure how we ended up here.”
Little discussed is the number of places where two Party coalitions are almost impossible. Birmingham is a shining example, but there are plenty more. Looks like Labour are putting Reform in to bat but with no prospect of an opportunity to assemble enough for control.
Lisa Nandy was on WATO and she sounded so down that the interviewer asked her about it. She admitted that they had lost 25 out of 25 seats in Wigan and she was "reeling". The full scale of Thursday's disaster for Labour is still sinking in. Pretty much every MP where there were elections will know councillors, MSPs or AMs who lost their seats. Its quite hard not to conclude that they cannot go on like this.
Nearly as bad. I fear that geniuses will be doubling down on how to win back Reform voters.
Little discussed is the number of places where two Party coalitions are almost impossible. Birmingham is a shining example, but there are plenty more. Looks like Labour are putting Reform in to bat but with no prospect of an opportunity to assemble enough for control.
UPDATE: Catherine West says she accidentally called for a leadership election "in September" in her email to Labour MPs
She meant a new leader should be in place by September, but wants the contest to begin "soon"
Man these people make the Tories look like the model of competence.
I seriously don't understand how anyone can take them seriously. The leader has a pretty poor relaunch speech, the noname challenger says it's not enough, then sends out an email saying actually no it's fine we'll wait until September and give Burnham a chance to get into parliament, now saying wait no I meant soon.
Wtf is she playing at, Labour already look completely incompetent and she's making things 10x worse. One or all of the potential runners needs to tell her to stfu and let them organise a coup.
She's a backbencher. She may be senior enough as a backbencher not to be Labour's Rehman Chishti, but she's probably less than Labour's Kit Malthouse.
On a more serious note, Labour's current talent pool is shallow because of how their parliamentary numbers progressed and the short election cycles in the 2010s. To an extent this is true of all parties coming into government, but it is acute this time. Labour have:
241 MPs returned to parliament in 2024 (a small handful of whom were returnees) 35 MPs returned to parliament in or after 2019, most under Corbyn's selection processes. 24 MPs returned in or after 2017 (and ditto Corbyn) 39 MPs returned in or after 2015 - this is mostly where we are fishing for leaders 32 MPs returned in or after 2010 32 MPs returned before 2010
Labour's parliamentary demographics are pretty bad.
"Data gathered by the global business insurer QBE via freedom of information requests reveals that fire brigades were called to 1,760 fires linked to lithium-ion batteries in 2025, equating to 4.8 fires a day, an increase of 147% over the past three years.
Electric vehicle fires rose by 133% over the same period, while the number of electric vehicles on UK roads tripled during that time.
QBE researchers found that ebike fires made up nearly a third of all lithium-ion battery fires nationally and noted that retrofitted and converted ebikes appeared to be disproportionately involved compared with certified models.
There were 520 callouts to fires involving ebikes in 2025, compared with 149 in 2022. London fire brigade (LFB) tackled 44% of these, with 230 ebike fires occurring in the capital last year and five related fatalities in the past three years."
It’s the Chinese kits, cheaply ordered online and often mislabeled, that are the problem. Customs need to be better at finding them, and trading standards need to be more proactive in policing bike shops reselling and fitting them. No, your electric Brompton isn’t going to ‘go on fire’.
I do wonder how well the Chinese cars are crash-tested, and if what arrives on the boat is then representative of what was certified. As with bikes, a Western-brand car is unlikely to catch fire in regular use, as opposed to after a major accident.
The EVs have about 10% of the rate of fires as fossil fuel vehicles, but they are typically far more serious incidents.
For "bikes" and similar, it is as noted down to a political decision not to regulate the marketplace for safety, unlike powertools, laptops, kettles and the rest.
This one is a really serious issue now that Insurance Companies and insurance companies are running ignorant, panicked and scared and clamping down on everything from a base of ignorance. Here is an example case that has been fought this year.
TLDR: Masters student at a Russell Group Uni had her power wheelchair attachment, which is fully certified and allowed on aeroplanes and costs about £3-4k, compulsorily stored in a security guard controlled 'shed' rather than her accommodation.
She could only access it by going to the accommodation, with a wait of 10-20 minutes. And when that was unstaffed it was a phone call to when security were on duty, and and even longer wait as it needed an elaborate explanation. How would we feel if forced to access our outdoor shoes on those terms?
By the time they checked with a real fire expert, her social life had been wrecked, the battery was damaged by the conditions and needed replacing (cost: £500), extra self-propelling had exacerbated shoulder injuries so basic tasks like opening doors became difficult, and more.
But the institution did not get any of it, even afterwards, even after they had acted on an assumed non-existent risk that they did not bother to find out about.
It is very difficult to enforce action on, which should have been able to be done the same day. But the enforcement mechanisms in the Equality Act were gutted in 2011, and now the bastards want to repeal the whole thing because they have a couple of bees in their bonnet.
Sounds like people inventing "safety cases" and process, because they need to do something. The Health & Safety classic.
It's not H&S gone mad. It is Government political failure to create an appropriate regulatory framework, which creates an easy, lazy "stop anyone doing it" assumption for Institutions and Insurance companies. And the little people are then fucked over by default as it is then the easy option, because not fucking them over becomes the more difficult option.
It's the classic Britishism - do nothing, arse-sit, and rely on the victims to be unable to do anything about it, rather than simply be competent.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
UPDATE: Catherine West says she accidentally called for a leadership election "in September" in her email to Labour MPs
She meant a new leader should be in place by September, but wants the contest to begin "soon"
Man these people make the Tories look like the model of competence.
I seriously don't understand how anyone can take them seriously. The leader has a pretty poor relaunch speech, the noname challenger says it's not enough, then sends out an email saying actually no it's fine we'll wait until September and give Burnham a chance to get into parliament, now saying wait no I meant soon.
Wtf is she playing at, Labour already look completely incompetent and she's making things 10x worse. One or all of the potential runners needs to tell her to stfu and let them organise a coup.
She's a backbencher. She may be senior enough as a backbencher not to be Labour's Rehman Chishti, but she's probably less than Labour's Kit Malthouse.
On a more serious note, Labour's current talent pool is shallow because of how their parliamentary numbers progressed and the short election cycles in the 2010s. To an extent this is true of all parties coming into government, but it is acute this time. Labour have:
241 MPs returned to parliament in 2024 (a small handful of whom were returnees) 35 MPs returned to parliament in or after 2019, most under Corbyn's selection processes. 24 MPs returned in or after 2017 (and ditto Corbyn) 39 MPs returned in or after 2015 - this is mostly where we are fishing for leaders 32 MPs returned in or after 2010 32 MPs returned before 2010
Labour's parliamentary demographics are pretty bad.
It's not fair to instantly write off those elected in 2017/19 but it's probably obvious why very few of them have got anywhere...
Pothole repair truck swallowed by pothole it was sent to fix  cf The Telegraph
Not a comment on politics today
Austerity cancelled 10 years worth of road repairs which is why everything is utterly falling apart now.
Reform in Darlington (elections 2027) are already going big on pot holes, I suspect the current administration will get the worst examples fixed this year but I doubt there is enough time.
Angela Rayners apparent full throttled support for Burnham helps to delay any leadership challenge . And also gives her more time for the HMRC investigation to conclude.
She’ll then be ready and waiting if either he doesn’t win the by-election or things unravel beforehand .
Possibly after the next tranche of Mandelson files are released .
UPDATE: Catherine West says she accidentally called for a leadership election "in September" in her email to Labour MPs
She meant a new leader should be in place by September, but wants the contest to begin "soon"
Man these people make the Tories look like the model of competence.
I seriously don't understand how anyone can take them seriously. The leader has a pretty poor relaunch speech, the noname challenger says it's not enough, then sends out an email saying actually no it's fine we'll wait until September and give Burnham a chance to get into parliament, now saying wait no I meant soon.
Wtf is she playing at, Labour already look completely incompetent and she's making things 10x worse. One or all of the potential runners needs to tell her to stfu and let them organise a coup.
She's a backbencher. She may be senior enough as a backbencher not to be Labour's Rehman Chishti, but she's probably less than Labour's Kit Malthouse.
On a more serious note, Labour's current talent pool is shallow because of how their parliamentary numbers progressed and the short election cycles in the 2010s. To an extent this is true of all parties coming into government, but it is acute this time. Labour have:
241 MPs returned to parliament in 2024 (a small handful of whom were returnees) 35 MPs returned to parliament in or after 2019, most under Corbyn's selection processes. 24 MPs returned in or after 2017 (and ditto Corbyn) 39 MPs returned in or after 2015 - this is mostly where we are fishing for leaders 32 MPs returned in or after 2010 32 MPs returned before 2010
Labour's parliamentary demographics are pretty bad.
It's not fair to instantly write off those elected in 2017/19 but it's probably obvious why very few of them have got anywhere...
The disappearance of safe seats is going to lead to a lot more of this. Not entirely sure how electing 250+ Reform MP's with no experience of Westminster whatsoever will fix things.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
"Data gathered by the global business insurer QBE via freedom of information requests reveals that fire brigades were called to 1,760 fires linked to lithium-ion batteries in 2025, equating to 4.8 fires a day, an increase of 147% over the past three years.
Electric vehicle fires rose by 133% over the same period, while the number of electric vehicles on UK roads tripled during that time.
QBE researchers found that ebike fires made up nearly a third of all lithium-ion battery fires nationally and noted that retrofitted and converted ebikes appeared to be disproportionately involved compared with certified models.
There were 520 callouts to fires involving ebikes in 2025, compared with 149 in 2022. London fire brigade (LFB) tackled 44% of these, with 230 ebike fires occurring in the capital last year and five related fatalities in the past three years."
It’s the Chinese kits, cheaply ordered online and often mislabeled, that are the problem. Customs need to be better at finding them, and trading standards need to be more proactive in policing bike shops reselling and fitting them. No, your electric Brompton isn’t going to ‘go on fire’.
I do wonder how well the Chinese cars are crash-tested, and if what arrives on the boat is then representative of what was certified. As with bikes, a Western-brand car is unlikely to catch fire in regular use, as opposed to after a major accident.
The EVs have about 10% of the rate of fires as fossil fuel vehicles, but they are typically far more serious incidents.
For "bikes" and similar, it is as noted down to a political decision not to regulate the marketplace for safety, unlike powertools, laptops, kettles and the rest.
This one is a really serious issue now that Insurance Companies and insurance companies are running ignorant, panicked and scared and clamping down on everything from a base of ignorance. Here is an example case that has been fought this year.
TLDR: Masters student at a Russell Group Uni had her power wheelchair attachment, which is fully certified and allowed on aeroplanes and costs about £3-4k, compulsorily stored in a security guard controlled 'shed' rather than her accommodation.
She could only access it by going to the accommodation, with a wait of 10-20 minutes. And when that was unstaffed it was a phone call to when security were on duty, and and even longer wait as it needed an elaborate explanation. How would we feel if forced to access our outdoor shoes on those terms?
By the time they checked with a real fire expert, her social life had been wrecked, the battery was damaged by the conditions and needed replacing (cost: £500), extra self-propelling had exacerbated shoulder injuries so basic tasks like opening doors became difficult, and more.
But the institution did not get any of it, even afterwards, even after they had acted on an assumed non-existent risk that they did not bother to find out about.
It is very difficult to enforce action on, which should have been able to be done the same day. But the enforcement mechanisms in the Equality Act were gutted in 2011, and now the bastards want to repeal the whole thing because they have a couple of bees in their bonnet.
Sounds like people inventing "safety cases" and process, because they need to do something. The Health & Safety classic.
It's not H&S gone mad. It is Government political failure to create an appropriate regulatory framework, which creates an easy, lazy "stop anyone doing it" assumption for Institutions and Insurance companies. And the little people are then fucked over by default as it is then the easy option, because not fucking them over becomes the more difficult option.
It's the classic Britishism - do nothing, arse-sit, and rely on the victims to be unable to do anything about it, rather than simply be competent.
From what I read, people who didn't know what they were doing started making stuff up, rather than talking to actual fire experts.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.” “What did you teach?” "Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.” “After being a teacher all your life?” “It did mean a change of perspective, yes.” “But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…” Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
UPDATE: Catherine West says she accidentally called for a leadership election "in September" in her email to Labour MPs
She meant a new leader should be in place by September, but wants the contest to begin "soon"
Man these people make the Tories look like the model of competence.
I seriously don't understand how anyone can take them seriously. The leader has a pretty poor relaunch speech, the noname challenger says it's not enough, then sends out an email saying actually no it's fine we'll wait until September and give Burnham a chance to get into parliament, now saying wait no I meant soon.
Wtf is she playing at, Labour already look completely incompetent and she's making things 10x worse. One or all of the potential runners needs to tell her to stfu and let them organise a coup.
She's a backbencher. She may be senior enough as a backbencher not to be Labour's Rehman Chishti, but she's probably less than Labour's Kit Malthouse.
On a more serious note, Labour's current talent pool is shallow because of how their parliamentary numbers progressed and the short election cycles in the 2010s. To an extent this is true of all parties coming into government, but it is acute this time. Labour have:
241 MPs returned to parliament in 2024 (a small handful of whom were returnees) 35 MPs returned to parliament in or after 2019, most under Corbyn's selection processes. 24 MPs returned in or after 2017 (and ditto Corbyn) 39 MPs returned in or after 2015 - this is mostly where we are fishing for leaders 32 MPs returned in or after 2010 32 MPs returned before 2010
Labour's parliamentary demographics are pretty bad.
It's not fair to instantly write off those elected in 2017/19 but it's probably obvious why very few of them have got anywhere...
The disappearance of safe seats is going to lead to a lot more of this. Not entirely sure how electing 250+ Reform MP's with no experience of Westminster whatsoever will fix things.
I think that’s part of the thinking behind recruiting a number of former MPs who were ministers under the Tories.
As may have been suggested several times before, he needs to use his £5m donation to set up a shadow government, with Secretaries of State, junior ministers, and researchers, so that everyone understands their role if they get into government.
Cameron did this, as did Blair before him, although it’s obviously a lot easier as the official Opposition with piles of Short Money.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
SNP changed the Scot Gov. rules recently. Can't happen for Westminster.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Green MSP, if you’re capable of telling the difference. Trans as well!
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
Besides, there's the stress of dealing with shouty, clueless, emotionally incontinent children all day...
Probably not, but he's either bottled it or doesn't have the numbers. I suppose he could act in the next few days, but will he ? He's ceeding initiative to his leadership rivals at any rate.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Green MSP, if you’re capable of telling the difference. Trans as well!
I think they are a PhD student, possibly graduate now? AIUI they were looking for an extension of their existing education visa.
Meanwhile, does this former councillor count double?
A newly-elected councillor has resigned from his post just days after being elected to Essex County Council and Rochford District Council. Stuart Prior has had his membership of Reform UK revoked, it has been revealed.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.” “What did you teach?” "Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.” “After being a teacher all your life?” “It did mean a change of perspective, yes.” “But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…” Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
SNP changed the Scot Gov. rules recently. Can't happen for Westminster.
Just as well that being an MSP doesn't qualify as work, isn't it?
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.” “What did you teach?” "Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.” “After being a teacher all your life?” “It did mean a change of perspective, yes.” “But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…” Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
God, I miss him.
"Detritus stood up. There was something about the way he did it, some hint of a mighty continent beginning a tectonic movement that would end in the fearsome creation of some unscalable mountain range, that made people stop and look. Not one of the watchers was familiar with the experience of mountain building, but now they had some vague idea of what it was like: it was like Detritus standing up, with Cuddy's twisted axe in his hand."
Meanwhile, does this former councillor count double?
A newly-elected councillor has resigned from his post just days after being elected to Essex County Council and Rochford District Council. Stuart Prior has had his membership of Reform UK revoked, it has been revealed.
Meanwhile, does this former councillor count double?
A newly-elected councillor has resigned from his post just days after being elected to Essex County Council and Rochford District Council. Stuart Prior has had his membership of Reform UK revoked, it has been revealed.
Probably not, but he's either bottled it or doesn't have the numbers. I suppose he could act in the next few days, but will he ? He's ceeding initiative to his leadership rivals at any rate.
I think its gone. He has no chance of beating Burnham if Burnham gets back in. And he has thrown away his chance of having a leadership campaign before Burnham gets back. Oh well.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Green MSP, if you’re capable of telling the difference. Trans as well!
Meanwhile, does this former councillor count double?
A newly-elected councillor has resigned from his post just days after being elected to Essex County Council and Rochford District Council. Stuart Prior has had his membership of Reform UK revoked, it has been revealed.
I can only say in my constituency, Angus South, we got more leaflets from the SNP than all the many other candidates put together and the SNP campaign was the only online campaign I came across. In fairness, most of social media is a complete unknown to me and it is entirely possible that the other parties were doing a lot of Facebook or the like but I did not get the impression that the SNP campaign was short of money, quite the opposite.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
It's not, I believe, for the elected authority to question the immigration status of any candidate. As long as they can prove they are resident in the Borough, that's all the qualification required.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
The seats up this year were mostly in London and urban areas, if the Greens couldn't even beat the Tories this year they certainly won't next year when the seats up are mainly in market towns and rural shires
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.” “What did you teach?” "Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.” “After being a teacher all your life?” “It did mean a change of perspective, yes.” “But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…” Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
God, I miss him.
"Detritus stood up. There was something about the way he did it, some hint of a mighty continent beginning a tectonic movement that would end in the fearsome creation of some unscalable mountain range, that made people stop and look. Not one of the watchers was familiar with the experience of mountain building, but now they had some vague idea of what it was like: it was like Detritus standing up, with Cuddy's twisted axe in his hand."
I think my favourite is: “If you trust in yourself... and believe in your dreams... and follow your star... you’ll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren’t so lazy.”
No detailed figures as yet from Newham but the Council calendar gives a hint of the internal confusion following last Thursday's election.
The Cabinet scheduled for Tuesday May 19th has been cancelled leaving the first gathering of the new Council the AGM on Wednesday May 20th. Of the 67 councillors who atteneded the last Council meeting, only 26 will be attending the next such has been the turnover,
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
I like the fact he's here as a student, thansk to the generous welcome of the United Kingdom, and his show of gratitude is to try and destroy the country between lectures
Next time I go on assignment abroad I might try the same, I'm off to Italy for a week quite soon, thanks to the Italian taxpayer, and on the Thursday I might attempt to break south Tyrol from Rome, to show how much I appreciate their hospitality
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
The seats up this year were mostly in London and urban areas, if the Greens couldn't even beat the Tories this year they certainly won't next year when the seats up are mainly in market towns and rural shires
If the evidence of voting in market towns and shires this time is owt to go by, then the Tories are in for a shellacking.
EXC: Lisa Nandy tells @cathynewman there will be no return to single market or free movement with the EU (raising the question of how far Keir Starmer's EU reset announced this AM can actually go)
“I don't think anyone in this country wants to reopen the Brexit debate. We had a referendum. That referendum was won by leave. "The majority of people voted for it…. there's no appetite, either from the government, from Europe, or from the public, I think, to start getting into renegotiating things like free movement, single market access. "We went around that track for years during the Brexit wars. This country doesn't need any more division."
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
I like the fact he's here as a student, thansk to the generous welcome of the United Kingdom, and his show of gratitude is to try and destroy the country between lectures
Next time I go on assignment abroad I might try the same, I'm off to Italy for a week quite soon, thanks to the Italian taxpayer, and on the Thursday I might attempt to break south Tyrol from Rome, to show how much I appreciate their hospitality
THROW THESE PEOPLE OUT
Your robust support for free speech is noted.
Aren't you concerned that at, some point in the future, it is your views that will be ruled illegal?
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Was 19 % and second place according to Curtice.
Curtice has them at 18%. Sky News at 14%.
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
Probably not, but he's either bottled it or doesn't have the numbers. I suppose he could act in the next few days, but will he ? He's ceeding initiative to his leadership rivals at any rate.
I think its gone. He has no chance of beating Burnham if Burnham gets back in. And he has thrown away his chance of having a leadership campaign before Burnham gets back. Oh well.
Not so sure about that.
It was well-trailed that Starmer would be giving a reset speech this morning. Makes sense to wait and see what was actually said — and, more importantly, how it landed.
Then there’s the King’s Speech later this week. Difficult to make a move now without looking disloyal during a week like this. Better to get that out of the way first.
Meanwhile, any potential opponents look to be in disarray. Burnham’s hand has been forced, but even his apostles seem to be saying “wait, wait, not yet — we still need to find Andy a seat first.” Rayner’s in an awkward spot because she’s still waiting on the outcome of the HMRC investigation. Every time she speaks you can practically hear “I want your job”, but she can’t say it outright in case HMRC rules the wrong way. Miliband is… well, Miliband. Half the time he looks unsure whether he wants the top job or would rather be Chancellor. There’s definite appeal in being kingmaker — but kingmaker for whom? And then there’s Catherine West. Moving swiftly on…
I actually think Wes is in quite a strong position. He’s kept his head down, said relatively little, got on with the job, and let everyone around him participate in a circular firing squad. He can trigger a leadership race whenever he likes, knowing Burnham isn’t in Parliament and Rayner still hasn’t been cleared.
Meanwhile, does this former councillor count double?
A newly-elected councillor has resigned from his post just days after being elected to Essex County Council and Rochford District Council. Stuart Prior has had his membership of Reform UK revoked, it has been revealed.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
The seats up this year were mostly in London and urban areas, if the Greens couldn't even beat the Tories this year they certainly won't next year when the seats up are mainly in market towns and rural shires
If the evidence of voting in market towns and shires this time is owt to go by, then the Tories are in for a shellacking.
In the equivalent 2023 round of elections, the Conservatives lost over 1000 seats to Labour, LDs and Greens.
To be fair, a number of authorities which held elections last time won't exist by May 2027 such as the Surrey District and Borough Councils so there will be fewer seats contested.
The scope for large gains and losses is therefore reduced.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.” “What did you teach?” "Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.” “After being a teacher all your life?” “It did mean a change of perspective, yes.” “But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…” Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
God, I miss him.
"Detritus stood up. There was something about the way he did it, some hint of a mighty continent beginning a tectonic movement that would end in the fearsome creation of some unscalable mountain range, that made people stop and look. Not one of the watchers was familiar with the experience of mountain building, but now they had some vague idea of what it was like: it was like Detritus standing up, with Cuddy's twisted axe in his hand."
I think my favourite is: “If you trust in yourself... and believe in your dreams... and follow your star... you’ll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren’t so lazy.”
“Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.”
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
The seats up this year were mostly in London and urban areas, if the Greens couldn't even beat the Tories this year they certainly won't next year when the seats up are mainly in market towns and rural shires
If the evidence of voting in market towns and shires this time is owt to go by, then the Tories are in for a shellacking.
In the equivalent 2023 round of elections, the Conservatives lost over 1000 seats to Labour, LDs and Greens.
To be fair, a number of authorities which held elections last time won't exist by May 2027 such as the Surrey District and Borough Councils so there will be fewer seats contested.
The scope for large gains and losses is therefore reduced.
Indeed, plus once you exclude seats won in London the Tories still won about 100 more seats than the Greens when most Northern and Midlands big cities were up but most shire counties and district and unitary councils did not have elections
EXC: Lisa Nandy tells @cathynewman there will be no return to single market or free movement with the EU (raising the question of how far Keir Starmer's EU reset announced this AM can actually go)
“I don't think anyone in this country wants to reopen the Brexit debate. We had a referendum. That referendum was won by leave. "The majority of people voted for it…. there's no appetite, either from the government, from Europe, or from the public, I think, to start getting into renegotiating things like free movement, single market access. "We went around that track for years during the Brexit wars. This country doesn't need any more division."
If she thinks no-one in the country wants to reopen the discussion she is losing the plot.
63% want a closer relationship with the EU 55% want to rejoin 33% want to keep the current relationship
Whether its a good tactical party political or good economic decision may be up for debate but public demand for closer ties is not.
Probably not, but he's either bottled it or doesn't have the numbers. I suppose he could act in the next few days, but will he ? He's ceeding initiative to his leadership rivals at any rate.
I think its gone. He has no chance of beating Burnham if Burnham gets back in. And he has thrown away his chance of having a leadership campaign before Burnham gets back. Oh well.
Not so sure about that.
It was well-trailed that Starmer would be giving a reset speech this morning. Makes sense to wait and see what was actually said — and, more importantly, how it landed.
Then there’s the King’s Speech later this week. Difficult to make a move now without looking disloyal during a week like this. Better to get that out of the way first.
Meanwhile, any potential opponents look to be in disarray. Burnham’s hand has been forced, but even his apostles seem to be saying “wait, wait, not yet — we still need to find Andy a seat first.” Rayner’s in an awkward spot because she’s still waiting on the outcome of the HMRC investigation. Every time she speaks you can practically hear “I want your job”, but she can’t say it outright in case HMRC rules the wrong way. Miliband is… well, Miliband. Half the time he looks unsure whether he wants the top job or would rather be Chancellor. There’s definite appeal in being kingmaker — but kingmaker for whom? And then there’s Catherine West. Moving swiftly on…
I actually think Wes is in quite a strong position. He’s kept his head down, said relatively little, got on with the job, and let everyone around him participate in a circular firing squad. He can trigger a leadership race whenever he likes, knowing Burnham isn’t in Parliament and Rayner still hasn’t been cleared.
Which means he could resign at 5pm.
Or not.
Wes can trigger a contest if he has 81 MPs willing to nominate him, or at least knows enough (160 say) possibly willing to nominate him.
Unless that’s the case resigning is pointless so we move on to the next possible disaster where resigning is plausible
There's a remarkable large gap between the two NEV shares:
Sky NEV (Rallings & Thrasher methodology): Reform 27, Con 20, Lab 15, Green 14, LD 14, Ind 10
BBC PNS (Curtice / Fisher / English): Reform 26, Green 18, Lab 17, Con 17, LD 16
They agree the LDs were last, either alone or joint last. They agree Reform won most votes, they agree Labour failed to beat the Conservatives on NEV.
Where they disagree is on the Greens and Tories, Sky has the Tories a clear second with Labour just ahead of the Greens on NEV, the BBC had the Greens a narrow second
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
I like the fact he's here as a student, thansk to the generous welcome of the United Kingdom, and his show of gratitude is to try and destroy the country between lectures
Next time I go on assignment abroad I might try the same, I'm off to Italy for a week quite soon, thanks to the Italian taxpayer, and on the Thursday I might attempt to break south Tyrol from Rome, to show how much I appreciate their hospitality
THROW THESE PEOPLE OUT
When you were in Ukraine was that during or after your pro Putin period?
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
I like the fact he's here as a student, thansk to the generous welcome of the United Kingdom, and his show of gratitude is to try and destroy the country between lectures
Next time I go on assignment abroad I might try the same, I'm off to Italy for a week quite soon, thanks to the Italian taxpayer, and on the Thursday I might attempt to break south Tyrol from Rome, to show how much I appreciate their hospitality
THROW THESE PEOPLE OUT
Your robust support for free speech is noted.
Aren't you concerned that at, some point in the future, it is your views that will be ruled illegal?
I said nothing about legality or otherwise. I am just remarking on his quite incredible rudeness, lack of gratitude, and overall wankiness
Literally gets a visa to come to a lovely, generous, welcoming country and study, uses it to try and break up the country. Are we the only nation that tolerates this kind of twattery?
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Was 19 % and second place according to Curtice.
Curtice has them at 18%. Sky News at 14%.
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
Well indeed. I confess I've never really understood NEV. Firstly. There are two sets of figures, always different, occasionally, quite substantially. Such as this example. Then there is the fact that it extrapolates the votes of areas which haven't voted. One of the big takeaways was lack of any national pattern, with all Parties producing surprising results. Wouldn't it just be easier to total all the votes cast and see if it has gone up or down or whatever?
EXC: Lisa Nandy tells @cathynewman there will be no return to single market or free movement with the EU (raising the question of how far Keir Starmer's EU reset announced this AM can actually go)
“I don't think anyone in this country wants to reopen the Brexit debate. We had a referendum. That referendum was won by leave. "The majority of people voted for it…. there's no appetite, either from the government, from Europe, or from the public, I think, to start getting into renegotiating things like free movement, single market access. "We went around that track for years during the Brexit wars. This country doesn't need any more division."
If she thinks no-one in the country wants to reopen the discussion she is losing the plot.
63% want a closer relationship with the EU 55% want to rejoin 33% want to keep the current relationship
Whether its a good tactical party political or good economic decision may be up for debate but public demand for closer ties is not.
It highlights the political problem for Labour though. It's the last thing Labour candidates in the Reform Wall need. When Starmer goes, maybe Europe will bring down the next Labour PM.
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
I think distraught was a characterisation not his words.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
Did I read that right, that an Indian student, not a UK citizen and in the UK on a non-working temp visa, got elected as an MSP?
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
For some strange reason, it's a lot easier to be a candidate than a voter.
I like the fact he's here as a student, thansk to the generous welcome of the United Kingdom, and his show of gratitude is to try and destroy the country between lectures
Next time I go on assignment abroad I might try the same, I'm off to Italy for a week quite soon, thanks to the Italian taxpayer, and on the Thursday I might attempt to break south Tyrol from Rome, to show how much I appreciate their hospitality
THROW THESE PEOPLE OUT
Your robust support for free speech is noted.
Aren't you concerned that at, some point in the future, it is your views that will be ruled illegal?
I said nothing about legality or otherwise. I am just remarking on his quite incredible rudeness, lack of gratitude, and overall wankiness
Literally gets a visa to come to a lovely, generous, welcoming country and study, uses it to try and break up the country. Are we the only nation that tolerates this kind of twattery?
it's one thing allowing foreign nationals a vote, quite another allowing them to stand for elected office. I don't think it particularly controversial to require at least permanent leave to remain, preferably nationality for both.
There's a remarkable large gap between the two NEV shares:
Sky NEV (Rallings & Thrasher methodology): Reform 27, Con 20, Lab 15, Green 14, LD 14, Ind 10
BBC PNS (Curtice / Fisher / English): Reform 26, Green 18, Lab 17, Con 17, LD 16
They agree the LDs were last, either alone or joint last. They agree Reform won most votes, they agree Labour failed to beat the Conservatives on NEV.
Where they disagree is on the Greens and Tories, Sky has the Tories a clear second with Labour just ahead of the Greens on NEV, the BBC had the Greens a narrow second
Well, on one the LDs are level with the Conservatives... and on the other they're six points behind. That's a massive difference.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Was 19 % and second place according to Curtice.
Curtice has them at 18%. Sky News at 14%.
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
Hmmm... it still doesn't *really* give us that much information, other than explaining that it's England only.
The modelling is clearly made much harder with the big rises in not just Reform and Green, but also the rise in number of Green candidates. It is not surprising the outcomes look much more volatile this time around than we are used to.
If you are a teacher in an academy school (not local authority maintained) can you be a councillor for that council area?
Yes only civil servants and local council workers and judges and police (apart from Parish councils) can't
Depends how senior a Civil Servant you are. When I started working in an Education quango I could stand for a council that didn't have an education authority.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Was 19 % and second place according to Curtice.
Curtice has them at 18%. Sky News at 14%.
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
It matters not a lot compared with the general picture. The forgotten bit is that about 73 out of 100 didn't vote Reform. All is to play for.
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Was 19 % and second place according to Curtice.
Curtice has them at 18%. Sky News at 14%.
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
Well indeed. I confess I've never really understood NEV. Firstly. There are two sets of figures, always different, occasionally, quite substantially. Such as this example. Then there is the fact that it extrapolates the votes of areas which haven't voted. One of the big takeaways was lack of any national pattern, with all Parties producing surprising results. Wouldn't it just be easier to total all the votes cast and see if it has gone up or down or whatever?
Yes it is easier. It is also less accurate.
None of it is especially accurate or useful given the volatility inherent in our politics and best part of 3 years to an election anyway.
There's a remarkable large gap between the two NEV shares:
Sky NEV (Rallings & Thrasher methodology): Reform 27, Con 20, Lab 15, Green 14, LD 14, Ind 10
BBC PNS (Curtice / Fisher / English): Reform 26, Green 18, Lab 17, Con 17, LD 16
They agree the LDs were last, either alone or joint last. They agree Reform won most votes, they agree Labour failed to beat the Conservatives on NEV.
Where they disagree is on the Greens and Tories, Sky has the Tories a clear second with Labour just ahead of the Greens on NEV, the BBC had the Greens a narrow second
Well, on one the LDs are level with the Conservatives... and on the other they're six points behind. That's a massive difference.
The Tories are ahead of the LDs with both, just by 6% with Sky and 1% with the BBC NEV
Probably not, but he's either bottled it or doesn't have the numbers. I suppose he could act in the next few days, but will he ? He's ceeding initiative to his leadership rivals at any rate.
I think its gone. He has no chance of beating Burnham if Burnham gets back in. And he has thrown away his chance of having a leadership campaign before Burnham gets back. Oh well.
Not so sure about that.
It was well-trailed that Starmer would be giving a reset speech this morning. Makes sense to wait and see what was actually said — and, more importantly, how it landed.
Then there’s the King’s Speech later this week. Difficult to make a move now without looking disloyal during a week like this. Better to get that out of the way first.
Meanwhile, any potential opponents look to be in disarray. Burnham’s hand has been forced, but even his apostles seem to be saying “wait, wait, not yet — we still need to find Andy a seat first.” Rayner’s in an awkward spot because she’s still waiting on the outcome of the HMRC investigation. Every time she speaks you can practically hear “I want your job”, but she can’t say it outright in case HMRC rules the wrong way. Miliband is… well, Miliband. Half the time he looks unsure whether he wants the top job or would rather be Chancellor. There’s definite appeal in being kingmaker — but kingmaker for whom? And then there’s Catherine West. Moving swiftly on…
I actually think Wes is in quite a strong position. He’s kept his head down, said relatively little, got on with the job, and let everyone around him participate in a circular firing squad. He can trigger a leadership race whenever he likes, knowing Burnham isn’t in Parliament and Rayner still hasn’t been cleared.
Which means he could resign at 5pm.
Or not.
Wes can trigger a contest if he has 81 MPs willing to nominate him, or at least knows enough (160 say) possibly willing to nominate him.
Unless that’s the case resigning is pointless so we move on to the next possible disaster where resigning is plausible
The question is does Wes have enough support amongst the Cabinet and senior members of the Party ? If he hasn't neutered that source of opposition, then it's always possible somebody from within raises their head above the parapet and says "Actually, I'm going to run because I am a compromise or unity candidate".
I bought three "Roman coins" found in Britain, from a metal detectorist, to go on my Wondersill (TM)
They are very humble things, which is why the trio cost me £10 total. But when you dig it into them, they become evermore fascinating
First is the Gloria Exercitvs (c 330-341 AD) - a Constantinian "follis/nummus"
This was minted at the end of a century of debasement. Cheap bronze with a hint of silver, now gone. It would have bought a loaf of decent bread, an evening at the baths, a cup of wine in a tavern, or a small portion of olives or cheese. The kind of coin a soldier would toss to a beggar. A tiny but brilliant insight into Roman life in the late Empire
Second is a Gallic Empire radiate (c 270-274 AD) - an antoninianus of Tetricus or similar
This also came at the end of a period of debasement. Brilliantly, and however, it was the right coin to buy one bunk-up in a cheap army brothel (judging by rates in Britain at the time). So it fits my history
Third isn't even Roman at all. The guy on eBay misidentified it. The last coin is a Nuremberg jeton from the 17th century. And it's not even a coin, it's a token for calculation: a merchant or tax collector in some half-timbered German hall would push these tokens around squares representing units - tens, hundreds, thousands, to do his sums. How did it end up in a muddy British field?
All that for £10. Cost of a London pint
I honestly recommend looking for metal detectorist "job lots". They find so much stuff they don't really check what it is, unless it glints of silver or gold, so they sell it in modest bulk, and you can find amazing things, by looking harder
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
Catherine West has backed down for seemingly no logical reason I can understand.
She was bluffing, just trying to nudge the big names? Either that or now persuaded to wait for Burnham.
Quiet word from Ange, who is going to ensure there is now a Cabinet challenge to Starmer- if not by herself. She wants to wait for Burnham. A promisse of Chancellor from Andy mebbe?
Anyway, Starmer is gone this year, most likely by Conference.
OK, so next thing: how exactly does Andy get back in?
He doesn't, he'll lose the by-election to the Greens. And Reform will take the GM Mayoralty. Absolute Cinema
He missed his chance - if he wanted to be PM this parliament he should have stood at the GE. He decided to carry on as GM Mayor instead and Starmer is right to hold him to that.
The sooner Labour realise Burnham isn't going to be able to save them the better (and he wouldn't anyway, IMO he will be worse than Starmer). Then they would be able to choose one of the available options now, then shut up. But they won't.
The Greens and Reform have the Big Mo, there is no safe seat he can land in now.
Burnham polls better than Polanski or Farage and the Greens were a pathetic fifth on seats won last week
A pathetic 5th finishing 214 seats behind the Tories closing the gap from 1218 at start of play.
momentum
Sure: the Greens made progress and gained a lot of seats. But these were also a near perfect election for them to stand in: the London Boroughs, Oxford, Bristol, Exeter - all places absolutely stuffed with students. They also fell back in places where their Gaza stance had previously been a differentiator.
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Was 19 % and second place according to Curtice.
Curtice has them at 18%. Sky News at 14%.
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
Well indeed. I confess I've never really understood NEV. Firstly. There are two sets of figures, always different, occasionally, quite substantially. Such as this example. Then there is the fact that it extrapolates the votes of areas which haven't voted. One of the big takeaways was lack of any national pattern, with all Parties producing surprising results. Wouldn't it just be easier to total all the votes cast and see if it has gone up or down or whatever?
Yes it is easier. It is also less accurate.
None of it is especially accurate or useful given the volatility inherent in our politics and best part of 3 years to an election anyway.
It isn't though. It's more accurate. Because it would only count votes actually cast. And we wouldn't be wondering if the Greens came second or fifth, or whether the Tories were six ahead of the Lib Dems or level.
There's a remarkable large gap between the two NEV shares:
Sky NEV (Rallings & Thrasher methodology): Reform 27, Con 20, Lab 15, Green 14, LD 14, Ind 10
BBC PNS (Curtice / Fisher / English): Reform 26, Green 18, Lab 17, Con 17, LD 16
They agree the LDs were last, either alone or joint last. They agree Reform won most votes, they agree Labour failed to beat the Conservatives on NEV.
Where they disagree is on the Greens and Tories, Sky has the Tories a clear second with Labour just ahead of the Greens on NEV, the BBC had the Greens a narrow second
Well, on one the LDs are level with the Conservatives... and on the other they're six points behind. That's a massive difference.
The Tories are ahead of the LDs with both, just by 6% with Sky and 1% with the BBC NEV
You are correct, and I am wrong.
Still, on one the Conservatives get almost 50% more votes than the LDs, and on the other, they're practically level.
Apparently Andy Burnham has told backers he has a plan and a seat.
But no MP resignation yet!
All eyes on this..
Why am I reminded of the closing scene from The Italian Job?
It's not remotely as entertaining as the Italian job. It is a pathetic spectacle of inadequate people failing to do basic tasks
This is the nation that conquered almost a third of the world in a century or so. Look at us now. Look at the imbeciles that purport to rule us. Jesus Effing Christ
Any update on the "distraught" Welsh supply teacher who got in the Senedd for Reform? Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind. “Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.” “What did you teach?” "Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.” “After being a teacher all your life?” “It did mean a change of perspective, yes.” “But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…” Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
God, I miss him.
"Detritus stood up. There was something about the way he did it, some hint of a mighty continent beginning a tectonic movement that would end in the fearsome creation of some unscalable mountain range, that made people stop and look. Not one of the watchers was familiar with the experience of mountain building, but now they had some vague idea of what it was like: it was like Detritus standing up, with Cuddy's twisted axe in his hand."
I think my favourite is: “If you trust in yourself... and believe in your dreams... and follow your star... you’ll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren’t so lazy.”
“Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.”
Personally like " You need only walk through that door and you will never hear from me again" (From Going Postal. Moist, of course, realizes the downside of not hearing from Vetinari again, Reacher Gilt does not...)
Comments
The A&C I saw back in the day were Vanessa Redgrave and Timothy Dalton who, I believe, were actually a pair.
I seriously don't understand how anyone can take them seriously. The leader has a pretty poor relaunch speech, the noname challenger says it's not enough, then sends out an email saying actually no it's fine we'll wait until September and give Burnham a chance to get into parliament, now saying wait no I meant soon.
Wtf is she playing at, Labour already look completely incompetent and she's making things 10x worse. One or all of the potential runners needs to tell her to stfu and let them organise a coup.
How far have you fallen, when your own MPs claim to be closer to Mandelson than you?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckgpn72r9p1o
Little discussed is the number of places where two Party coalitions are almost impossible. Birmingham is a shining example, but there are plenty more.
Looks like Labour are putting Reform in to bat but with no prospect of an opportunity to assemble enough for control.
Thoughts from a Labour MP:
“We have to face up to the fact every single one of them is fucking useless. Andy’s strategy has been a disaster. Angela has bottled it. Ed clearly a hiding to nothing. Wes is AWOL. God knows what Catherine West is doing. I am not quite sure how we ended up here.”
Starmer's new "special envoy" already hard at work, handing out peerages.
Message since deleted, but this was sent to Labour's defeated leader in Oldham.

cf The Telegraph
Not a comment on politics today
On a more serious note, Labour's current talent pool is shallow because of how their parliamentary numbers progressed and the short election cycles in the 2010s. To an extent this is true of all parties coming into government, but it is acute this time. Labour have:
241 MPs returned to parliament in 2024 (a small handful of whom were returnees)
35 MPs returned to parliament in or after 2019, most under Corbyn's selection processes.
24 MPs returned in or after 2017 (and ditto Corbyn)
39 MPs returned in or after 2015 - this is mostly where we are fishing for leaders
32 MPs returned in or after 2010
32 MPs returned before 2010
Labour's parliamentary demographics are pretty bad.
It's the classic Britishism - do nothing, arse-sit, and rely on the victims to be unable to do anything about it, rather than simply be competent.
Reform in Darlington (elections 2027) are already going big on pot holes, I suspect the current administration will get the worst examples fixed this year but I doubt there is enough time.
Angela Rayners apparent full throttled support for Burnham helps to delay any leadership challenge . And also gives her more time for the HMRC investigation to conclude.
She’ll then be ready and waiting if either he doesn’t win the by-election or things unravel beforehand .
Possibly after the next tranche of Mandelson files are released .
Not entirely sure how electing 250+ Reform MP's with no experience of Westminster whatsoever will fix things.
momentum
Has he discovered the £80k salary and handful of staff to be slightly more appealing than zero hours contracts in education, yet?
Without process, they were lost.
There's also the case of the new SNP MSP who's only allowed to be in the country for half his term unless he gets a new visa. Is MSP 'skilled'?
“You know, you sound a very educated man for a barbarian,” said Rincewind.
“Oh, dear me, I didn’t start out a barbarian. I used to be a school teacher. That’s why they call me Teach.”
“What did you teach?”
"Geography. And I was very interested in Auriental* studies. But I decided to give it up and make a living by the sword.”
“After being a teacher all your life?”
“It did mean a change of perspective, yes.”
“But … well … surely … the privation, the terrible hazards, the daily risk of death…”
Mr. Saveloy brightened up. “Oh, you’ve been a teacher, have you?”
📱 Scottish election digital spend (Since January 1st 2026):
🔍 Spend per seat won:
Scottish Labour: £26,068.95
SNP: £4,511
💷 Total:
Scottish Labour*: £443,172.09
SNP: £261,651.22
*Majority of Labour spend via Anas Sarwar's, UK Labour's and Scottish Labour's channels.
https://x.com/rosscolquhoun/status/2053822347107278871?s=61&t=LYVEHh2mqFy1oUJAdCfe-Q
As may have been suggested several times before, he needs to use his £5m donation to set up a shadow government, with Secretaries of State, junior ministers, and researchers, so that everyone understands their role if they get into government.
Cameron did this, as did Blair before him, although it’s obviously a lot easier as the official Opposition with piles of Short Money.
How many ineligibles or undesirables were elected last week, many of whom were only supposed to be paper candidates?
... or he can stick to working in a school.
Probably not, but he's either bottled it or doesn't have the numbers. I suppose he could act in the next few days, but will he ? He's ceeding initiative to his leadership rivals at any rate.
A newly-elected councillor has resigned from his post just days after being elected to Essex County Council and Rochford District Council. Stuart Prior has had his membership of Reform UK revoked, it has been revealed.
https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/reform-councillor-quits-just-days-10960052
Commonwealth citizen?
"Detritus stood up. There was something about the way he did it, some hint of a mighty continent beginning a tectonic movement that would end in the fearsome creation of some unscalable mountain range, that made people stop and look. Not one of the watchers was familiar with the experience of mountain building, but now they had some vague idea of what it was like: it was like Detritus standing up, with Cuddy's twisted axe in his hand."
I thought there was a swearing in proicess prior to the first meeting at which point the results were formally ratified.
“If you trust in yourself... and believe in your dreams... and follow your star... you’ll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren’t so lazy.”
No detailed figures as yet from Newham but the Council calendar gives a hint of the internal confusion following last Thursday's election.
The Cabinet scheduled for Tuesday May 19th has been cancelled leaving the first gathering of the new Council the AGM on Wednesday May 20th. Of the 67 councillors who atteneded the last Council meeting, only 26 will be attending the next such has been the turnover,
Next time I go on assignment abroad I might try the same, I'm off to Italy for a week quite soon, thanks to the Italian taxpayer, and on the Thursday I might attempt to break south Tyrol from Rome, to show how much I appreciate their hospitality
THROW THESE PEOPLE OUT
EXC: Lisa Nandy tells @cathynewman there will be no return to single market or free movement with the EU (raising the question of how far Keir Starmer's EU reset announced this AM can actually go)
“I don't think anyone in this country wants to reopen the Brexit debate. We had a referendum. That referendum was won by leave.
"The majority of people voted for it…. there's no appetite, either from the government, from Europe, or from the public, I think, to start getting into renegotiating things like free movement, single market access.
"We went around that track for years during the Brexit wars. This country doesn't need any more division."
Now, if I'm Polanski, am I unhappy? No. But I'm probably a little disappointed: 14% NEV is well below national opinion polls for the Greens.
Aren't you concerned that at, some point in the future, it is your views that will be ruled illegal?
I would like to see the workings on both those numbers.
It was well-trailed that Starmer would be giving a reset speech this morning. Makes sense to wait and see what was actually said — and, more importantly, how it landed.
Then there’s the King’s Speech later this week. Difficult to make a move now without looking disloyal during a week like this. Better to get that out of the way first.
Meanwhile, any potential opponents look to be in disarray. Burnham’s hand has been forced, but even his apostles seem to be saying “wait, wait, not yet — we still need to find Andy a seat first.” Rayner’s in an awkward spot because she’s still waiting on the outcome of the HMRC investigation. Every time she speaks you can practically hear “I want your job”, but she can’t say it outright in case HMRC rules the wrong way. Miliband is… well, Miliband. Half the time he looks unsure whether he wants the top job or would rather be Chancellor. There’s definite appeal in being kingmaker — but kingmaker for whom? And then there’s Catherine West. Moving swiftly on…
I actually think Wes is in quite a strong position. He’s kept his head down, said relatively little, got on with the job, and let everyone around him participate in a circular firing squad. He can trigger a leadership race whenever he likes, knowing Burnham isn’t in Parliament and Rayner still hasn’t been cleared.
Which means he could resign at 5pm.
Or not.
If not then by-election.
To be fair, a number of authorities which held elections last time won't exist by May 2027 such as the Surrey District and Borough Councils so there will be fewer seats contested.
The scope for large gains and losses is therefore reduced.
“Sometimes it's better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.”
Sky NEV (Rallings & Thrasher methodology): Reform 27, Con 20, Lab 15, Green 14, LD 14, Ind 10
BBC PNS (Curtice / Fisher / English): Reform 26, Green 18, Lab 17, Con 17, LD 16
63% want a closer relationship with the EU
55% want to rejoin
33% want to keep the current relationship
Whether its a good tactical party political or good economic decision may be up for debate but public demand for closer ties is not.
https://yougov.com/en-gb/articles/54567-how-strong-is-uk-support-for-rejoining-the-european-union
Unless that’s the case resigning is pointless so we move on to the next possible disaster where resigning is plausible
Where they disagree is on the Greens and Tories, Sky has the Tories a clear second with Labour just ahead of the Greens on NEV, the BBC had the Greens a narrow second
Literally gets a visa to come to a lovely, generous, welcoming country and study, uses it to try and break up the country. Are we the only nation that tolerates this kind of twattery?
I confess I've never really understood NEV.
Firstly. There are two sets of figures, always different, occasionally, quite substantially. Such as this example. Then there is the fact that it extrapolates the votes of areas which haven't voted. One of the big takeaways was lack of any national pattern, with all Parties producing surprising results.
Wouldn't it just be easier to total all the votes cast and see if it has gone up or down or whatever?
Apparently Andy Burnham has told backers he has a plan and a seat.
But no MP resignation yet!
All eyes on this..
I don't think it particularly controversial to require at least permanent leave to remain, preferably nationality for both.
None of it is especially accurate or useful given the volatility inherent in our politics and best part of 3 years to an election anyway.
The question is does Wes have enough support amongst the Cabinet and senior members of the Party ? If he hasn't neutered that source of opposition, then it's always possible somebody from within raises their head above the parapet and says "Actually, I'm going to run because I am a compromise or unity candidate".
I bought three "Roman coins" found in Britain, from a metal detectorist, to go on my Wondersill (TM)
They are very humble things, which is why the trio cost me £10 total. But when you dig it into them, they become evermore fascinating
First is the Gloria Exercitvs (c 330-341 AD) - a Constantinian "follis/nummus"
This was minted at the end of a century of debasement. Cheap bronze with a hint of silver, now gone. It would have bought a loaf of decent bread, an evening at the baths, a cup of wine in a tavern, or a small portion of olives or cheese. The kind of coin a soldier would toss to a beggar. A tiny but brilliant insight into Roman life in the late Empire
Second is a Gallic Empire radiate (c 270-274 AD) - an antoninianus of Tetricus or similar
This also came at the end of a period of debasement. Brilliantly, and however, it was the right coin to buy one bunk-up in a cheap army brothel (judging by rates in Britain at the time). So it fits my history
Third isn't even Roman at all. The guy on eBay misidentified it. The last coin is a Nuremberg jeton from the 17th century. And it's not even a coin, it's a token for calculation: a merchant or tax collector in some half-timbered German hall would push these tokens around squares representing units - tens, hundreds, thousands, to do his sums. How did it end up in a muddy British field?
All that for £10. Cost of a London pint
I honestly recommend looking for metal detectorist "job lots". They find so much stuff they don't really check what it is, unless it glints of silver or gold, so they sell it in modest bulk, and you can find amazing things, by looking harder
*goes back on eBay*
And we wouldn't be wondering if the Greens came second or fifth, or whether the Tories were six ahead of the Lib Dems or level.
Still, on one the Conservatives get almost 50% more votes than the LDs, and on the other, they're practically level.
They can't both be right.
This is the nation that conquered almost a third of the world in a century or so. Look at us now. Look at the imbeciles that purport to rule us. Jesus Effing Christ