Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
The House of Representatives has passed the FY2027 NDAA (H.R. 8800), which includes the proposal to expand defense cooperation between the United States and Israel — including joint collaboration on military technologies, missile defense, cyber capabilities, data sharing, and research and development.
Good article by @MoonRabbit but as ever 3 years away from a GE events tend to come along and upset predictions
Andy Burnham has certainly demonstrated how to do retail politics and Labour supporters should be very pleased
I expect a poll bounce in his and Labour's poll ratings and a demonstration to Starmer and his government just how badly they performed
The announcements so far have not been unaffordable but the hard miles lie ahead not least with Healey and Streeting ( and the public) wanting more defence spending
Interesting Lineker and 100 plus millionaires want higher taxes on them so I assume they will voluntary pay more to HMRC now to show goodwill
I do expect reform/restore/greens to fall back and more traditional politics re emerge over the months and years ahead
Never understood the shamed voluntary tax thing. Should everyone who wants more defence spending have to pay extra too? Those who want more hospital spending have to volunteer for shifts at the local A&E?
There is no reason people can't argue for the world they would like to live in, but live in the world we actually have.
Just wondering; is this the same Gary Lineker who successfully appealed against his unfairly high tax bill a few years ago?
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the Aztecs did quite extensively. Vance uses New World. The commentator North America. Not the same thing at all.
Amazing that the VP of the USA, a constituent part of North America, should conflate his country with the whole of the Americas. He doesn't seem very keen on many of the countries that currently make up the continent.
Did them naughty Aztecs also steal and eat people's pets?
They were partial to guinea pigs, I think ? Though they didn't eat much meat.
They ate dogs.
Yes, but did they enjoy it ? Guinea pigs remain part of the Andean cuisine; dogs don't.
Unless they had the symptomology of the Ameglian Major Cow the dogs are pretty unlikely to have enjoyed it.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
Good article by @MoonRabbit but as ever 3 years away from a GE events tend to come along and upset predictions
Andy Burnham has certainly demonstrated how to do retail politics and Labour supporters should be very pleased
I expect a poll bounce in his and Labour's poll ratings and a demonstration to Starmer and his government just how badly they performed
The announcements so far have not been unaffordable but the hard miles lie ahead not least with Healey and Streeting ( and the public) wanting more defence spending
Interesting Lineker and 100 plus millionaires want higher taxes on them so I assume they will voluntary pay more to HMRC now to show goodwill
I do expect reform/restore/greens to fall back and more traditional politics re emerge over the months and years ahead
Never understood the shamed voluntary tax thing. Should everyone who wants more defence spending have to pay extra too? Those who want more hospital spending have to volunteer for shifts at the local A&E?
There is no reason people can't argue for the world they would like to live in, but live in the world we actually have.
Just wondering; is this the same Gary Lineker who successfully appealed against his unfairly high tax bill a few years ago?
Good article by @MoonRabbit but as ever 3 years away from a GE events tend to come along and upset predictions
Andy Burnham has certainly demonstrated how to do retail politics and Labour supporters should be very pleased
I expect a poll bounce in his and Labour's poll ratings and a demonstration to Starmer and his government just how badly they performed
The announcements so far have not been unaffordable but the hard miles lie ahead not least with Healey and Streeting ( and the public) wanting more defence spending
Interesting Lineker and 100 plus millionaires want higher taxes on them so I assume they will voluntary pay more to HMRC now to show goodwill
I do expect reform/restore/greens to fall back and more traditional politics re emerge over the months and years ahead
Never understood the shamed voluntary tax thing. Should everyone who wants more defence spending have to pay extra too? Those who want more hospital spending have to volunteer for shifts at the local A&E?
There is no reason people can't argue for the world they would like to live in, but live in the world we actually have.
Just wondering; is this the same Gary Lineker who successfully appealed against his unfairly high tax bill a few years ago?
A Russian Su-57 fighter jet crashed on a training flight in Moscow oblast. The pilot survived. Some in Russia are claiming it was yet another example of friendly fire.
Good article by @MoonRabbit but as ever 3 years away from a GE events tend to come along and upset predictions
Andy Burnham has certainly demonstrated how to do retail politics and Labour supporters should be very pleased
I expect a poll bounce in his and Labour's poll ratings and a demonstration to Starmer and his government just how badly they performed
The announcements so far have not been unaffordable but the hard miles lie ahead not least with Healey and Streeting ( and the public) wanting more defence spending
Interesting Lineker and 100 plus millionaires want higher taxes on them so I assume they will voluntary pay more to HMRC now to show goodwill
I do expect reform/restore/greens to fall back and more traditional politics re emerge over the months and years ahead
Never understood the shamed voluntary tax thing. Should everyone who wants more defence spending have to pay extra too? Those who want more hospital spending have to volunteer for shifts at the local A&E?
There is no reason people can't argue for the world they would like to live in, but live in the world we actually have.
Just wondering; is this the same Gary Lineker who successfully appealed against his unfairly high tax bill a few years ago?
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Concerning Lib Dems, they just need to hold what they've got. They don't need to be doing anything very much seat-wise to depress the Tory vote share and ability to win seats. A point Alastair also makes.
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Concerning Lib Dems, they just need to hold what they've got. They don't need to be doing anything very much seat-wise to depress the Tory vote share and ability to win seats. A point Alastair also makes.
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
Should they not be trying to form a government at some point? Or is their last experience of having responsibility too scarring for them? Much more fun to be a small party carping from the sides.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
On current observations the Lib Dems will probably pick up another 20 or so seats from the Cons and a couple from Labour, leave them just short of the magic 100 seats. They are probably throwing all their resources in this confined area.
3 points and £100 for "without due care", or a course.
I had an incident similar to that about 10 years ago, except the distraction was a idiot in a bus trying to push his way into my lane to get round a broken down van in his lane, and the standing traffic I hit was somewhere you wouldn't normally expect to stop, rather than at a set of traffic lights.
The guy I hit and his passenger went "argh my neck" and took my insurer for a (dubiously justified, I was nearly stationary by the time I actually made contact) £50k personal industry claim. Pc Plod looked at the size of the claim, decided it was a court job for due care, cost me 6 points and £500. Dread to think what the whole episode cost me in increased insurance premiums over the following 5 years.
Based on how I was treated for a genuine accident (I was focused on the vehicle I thought might try to ram me!), I'd hope they throw the book at her for that peice of gratuitous stupidty.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
"A timely reminder for all of us that you should always keep your eyes on the road when calling Nigel Farage a wanker."
Or anyone else.
Whenever I drive, which isn’t that often these days, I’m usually of the view the car ahead of me is less than virtuous.
Along with the ones behind and to the side. Driving standards have plummeted since Covid, in my experience.
Not just driving standards, air passenger incidents. mental health pip claims, something seems to have happened around the time of Covid, even if that was not the cause.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
Manchester Mayoral election looks like a one way ticket to Labour. Will this have any impact on Clacton, by the way what is happening there does anyone know?
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
Good article by @MoonRabbit but as ever 3 years away from a GE events tend to come along and upset predictions
Andy Burnham has certainly demonstrated how to do retail politics and Labour supporters should be very pleased
I expect a poll bounce in his and Labour's poll ratings and a demonstration to Starmer and his government just how badly they performed
The announcements so far have not been unaffordable but the hard miles lie ahead not least with Healey and Streeting ( and the public) wanting more defence spending
Interesting Lineker and 100 plus millionaires want higher taxes on them so I assume they will voluntary pay more to HMRC now to show goodwill
I do expect reform/restore/greens to fall back and more traditional politics re emerge over the months and years ahead
Never understood the shamed voluntary tax thing. Should everyone who wants more defence spending have to pay extra too? Those who want more hospital spending have to volunteer for shifts at the local A&E?
There is no reason people can't argue for the world they would like to live in, but live in the world we actually have.
Just wondering; is this the same Gary Lineker who successfully appealed against his unfairly high tax bill a few years ago?
Yes, although PBers urging an end to the triple lock aren't writing cheques to DWP.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
We saw The Beautiful South there a few years back.
Cracking venue.
It's OK, Piece Hall is far better albeit less seats..
Quality humblebrag there 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Thanks for your insight. It’s always great to post online that you like something and some tedious self aggrandising blowhard comes along to rubbish it. Dunno what they get from it
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
That was the reaction to Sunak’s NICs cut too. Some pensioners took deep personal offence.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
That was the reaction to Sunak’s NICs cut too. Some pensioners took deep personal offence.
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
That was the reaction to Sunak’s NICs cut too. Some pensioners took deep personal offence.
Because politicians and activists were out, telling pensioners that a cut to NICs was a cut to pensions.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Concerning Lib Dems, they just need to hold what they've got. They don't need to be doing anything very much seat-wise to depress the Tory vote share and ability to win seats. A point Alastair also makes.
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
Should they not be trying to form a government at some point? Or is their last experience of having responsibility too scarring for them? Much more fun to be a small party carping from the sides.
The Lib Dem point is different from their effect on the Tories point. But it is a valid one in my view. The Lib Dems have worked out a modus operandi in pavement politics but it lacks ambition. There's a fair amount of talent in their ranks since the 2024 including MPs with previous careers in defence, health and social care, tech startups etc, which they aren't really deploying.
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
That was the reaction to Sunak’s NICs cut too. Some pensioners took deep personal offence.
Or the 75p pension rise in... (checks date)... 2000.
Blimey.
Highlights how deeply embedded the national sense of entitlement is, though.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
Alphabet beat on every headline number tonight. Revenue up 24%. Cloud up 82%. EPS of $9.11. But $6.26 of that EPS came from paper gains on Alphabet's Anthropic stake*, not from operations. Strip that out and operating EPS is about $2.85. Free cash flow went negative for the first time in Alphabet's history. Long-term debt more than doubled in six months. Stock buybacks dropped to zero. https://x.com/HedgieMarkets/status/2080035162906390756
*Actually Anthropic and SpaceX. But SpaceX is also likely way overvalued if they don't get Starship to work.
AI is here to stay, obviously. What's not obvious is the value being given to all of the companies spending tens of billions to try and dominate the market.
What's certain is that some of them will fail to do so.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
Polling shows that there's a section of Reform voters who like their policies, but have concerns about their readiness for govt. That suggests there's an opening for the Tories... except one of the main things that lost Tories voters in the right was their incompetence in govt, the same polling says. Can Kemi overcome the memories of the recent past?
Good article by @MoonRabbit but as ever 3 years away from a GE events tend to come along and upset predictions
Andy Burnham has certainly demonstrated how to do retail politics and Labour supporters should be very pleased
I expect a poll bounce in his and Labour's poll ratings and a demonstration to Starmer and his government just how badly they performed
The announcements so far have not been unaffordable but the hard miles lie ahead not least with Healey and Streeting ( and the public) wanting more defence spending
Interesting Lineker and 100 plus millionaires want higher taxes on them so I assume they will voluntary pay more to HMRC now to show goodwill
I do expect reform/restore/greens to fall back and more traditional politics re emerge over the months and years ahead
Never understood the shamed voluntary tax thing. Should everyone who wants more defence spending have to pay extra too? Those who want more hospital spending have to volunteer for shifts at the local A&E?
There is no reason people can't argue for the world they would like to live in, but live in the world we actually have.
Just wondering; is this the same Gary Lineker who successfully appealed against his unfairly high tax bill a few years ago?
Yes, although PBers urging an end to the triple lock aren't writing cheques to DWP.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
That was the reaction to Sunak’s NICs cut too. Some pensioners took deep personal offence.
Because politicians and activists were out, telling pensioners that a cut to NICs was a cut to pensions.
Lies are very useful in politics.
Not entirely. I distinctly remember someone phoning into the radio and complaining about a tax cut only for people in-work.
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’ https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
That was the reaction to Sunak’s NICs cut too. Some pensioners took deep personal offence.
Or the 75p pension rise in... (checks date)... 2000.
Blimey.
Highlights how deeply embedded the national sense of entitlement is, though.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the response will be grist to his mill. 'There is zero evidence of *widespread* child sacrifice. Is there evidence of a modicum of child sacrifice? Is that OK? The 'zero' then looks dishonest, because whilst the zero clearly applies to the evidence, it is placed in a sentence where the subject is the child sacrifice. I didn't know there was any child sacrifice.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
In the week that Starmer left Downing Street and took the latest ridiclous lectern with him, Burnham walked in and had no lectern, no notes and talked straight , what does Miss hissy Fit come up with.
A lectern on a Rooftop overlooking the River Thames. A heavily scripted speech.
Totally ignoring the fact that Burnham is merely warming up the Country with a deries of 6am announcements in the ful knowledge that until the Autum Budget that's all he can do, totally ignoring the fact that Burnham wants to get power out of London and across all parts of the nation and basically trying to con the Conservative party and the rest of the Country that she has credible ideas that are funded. The £47bn plan is funded by what??. Has she actually told us how and when, other than abolishing any plan or project to net zero and basically taking benefits away from anybody, everybody.
We now here that a significant number of experienced One Nation Tories are being excluded from selection lists and in some cases the Conservative Party because they wont denounce Net Zero nor the ECHR on which thousands of every day British Rights are protected.
Poor old grant Shapps has been told to shove off, may be Michael Green will have better luck. She leads a Shadow Cabinet that in terms of ability makes Labour look "gold standard" and the cult of Kemikaze grows by the day, divine arrogance, absolute power, more tight wing and authoritarian by the day .
She may think she is out doing Farage, given at least as many of Farages wooly support is ex-Labout as it is ex-Tory and many of those in areas Burnham can and will touch , it seems the cul de sac of potential Tory voter support is narrowing by the week.
They say some politicians are lucky.
Burnham definitely is
He's not Starmer Farage is on the wane Badenoch is deeply deranged Davey looks old and yesterdays man Polanski is seeing his recent voter surge ebb and return back home.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Concerning Lib Dems, they just need to hold what they've got. They don't need to be doing anything very much seat-wise to depress the Tory vote share and ability to win seats. A point Alastair also makes.
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
Should they not be trying to form a government at some point? Or is their last experience of having responsibility too scarring for them? Much more fun to be a small party carping from the sides.
The Lib Dem point is different from their effect on the Tories point. But it is a valid one in my view. The Lib Dems have worked out a modus operandi in pavement politics but it lacks ambition. There's a fair amount of talent in their ranks since the 2024 including MPs with previous careers in defence, health and social care, tech startups etc, which they aren't really deploying.
70-odd MPs and a guaranteed two PMQs for their leader, yet no-one knows what the LibDems are for other than wet photo-ops. Ed Davey should either improve his act or make way for someone who can enunciate a clear philosophy and deploy the Commons team to greater effect.
Catching up on Politics for the first time this week
Mrs BJ went into Theatres for ANOTHER major op aimed at stopping her Paraplegia turning into Quadriplegia
After the planned 4hr Op which lasted 11hrs we were told there was a further problem higher up that was going to mean a further op would be required. Thankfully a clearer MRI of the neck area clarified this wasnt the case so with time this op should see her arms retain there use.
Seems to me AB is doing well Darren Jones less so.
Early days but a positive change of direction is welcomed.
Keep it up Andy lad.
Sad to hear about Kevin Keegan and horrifying what happened to Ann Widdecombe.
Hopefully the wife is home by the weekend and the Non League football starts then too.
So happier less stressful times ahead hopefully
So sorry to hear, and yes, here's to things looking up for you both in a big way.
Alphabet beat on every headline number tonight. Revenue up 24%. Cloud up 82%. EPS of $9.11. But $6.26 of that EPS came from paper gains on Alphabet's Anthropic stake*, not from operations. Strip that out and operating EPS is about $2.85. Free cash flow went negative for the first time in Alphabet's history. Long-term debt more than doubled in six months. Stock buybacks dropped to zero. https://x.com/HedgieMarkets/status/2080035162906390756
*Actually Anthropic and SpaceX. But SpaceX is also likely way overvalued if they don't get Starship to work.
AI is here to stay, obviously. What's not obvious is the value being given to all of the companies spending tens of billions to try and dominate the market.
What's certain is that some of them will fail to do so.
The other problem is that when customers are charged more realistic prices, they might walk away.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
In the week that Starmer left Downing Street and took the latest ridiclous lectern with him, Burnham walked in and had no lectern, no notes and talked straight , what does Miss hissy Fit come up with.
A lectern on a Rooftop overlooking the River Thames. A heavily scripted speech.
Totally ignoring the fact that Burnham is merely warming up the Country with a deries of 6am announcements in the ful knowledge that until the Autum Budget that's all he can do, totally ignoring the fact that Burnham wants to get power out of London and across all parts of the nation and basically trying to con the Conservative party and the rest of the Country that she has credible ideas that are funded. The £47bn plan is funded by what??. Has she actually told us how and when, other than abolishing any plan or project to net zero and basically taking benefits away from anybody, everybody.
We now here that a significant number of experienced One Nation Tories are being excluded from selection lists and in some cases the Conservative Party because they wont denounce Net Zero nor the ECHR on which thousands of every day British Rights are protected.
Poor old grant Shapps has been told to shove off, may be Michael Green will have better luck. She leads a Shadow Cabinet that in terms of ability makes Labour look "gold standard" and the cult of Kemikaze grows by the day, divine arrogance, absolute power, more tight wing and authoritarian by the day .
She may think she is out doing Farage, given at least as many of Farages wooly support is ex-Labout as it is ex-Tory and many of those in areas Burnham can and will touch , it seems the cul de sac of potential Tory voter support is narrowing by the week.
They say some politicians are lucky.
Burnham definitely is
He's not Starmer Farage is on the wane Badenoch is deeply deranged Davey looks old and yesterdays man Polanski is seeing his recent voter surge ebb and return back home.
Some ideas here for the NHS to consider. The approach to bed numbers vs medics seems almost the diametric opposite of ours. Has anyone modelled the two systems to see which is more cost effective ?
Health care paradox: Korea achieves world-class longevity with fewest doctors among developed nations
Yet this longevity is supported by a strikingly lean clinical workforce.
Korea recorded just 2.6 practicing physicians per 1,000 people (including practitioners of traditional Korean medicine), the second-lowest ratio in the OECD after Costa Rica and well below the average of 4.0. Medical school graduation rates tell a similar story, yielding just 7.3 graduates per 100,000 residents compared to the international norm of 15.3.
To bridge this human gap, the Korean medical system relies heavily on capital-intensive infrastructure and high-volume patient turnover. The country boasts 12.5 hospital beds per 1,000 residents — nearly three times the OECD average — and leads the global bloc in diagnostic equipment, housing 46.7 CT scanners per million people.
This hyper-accessible infrastructure has fostered a culture of frequent clinical consultation. Koreans visited outpatient clinics an average of 17.9 times per year, nearly triple the OECD average of 6.6 visits and the highest rate recorded worldwide..
Inventing in equipment to improve productivity & quality at the same time. We have centuries of evidence, in a range of fields, that this works.
So you would imagine, but it would require a very large change in the way we currently run the NHS. How quickly/easily could you move in that direction, and what would be the cost ?
An implementing government would have to do it very quietly least they run into issues with NHS-staff-worship tendency that exists amongst chunks of the public.
The sooner we start seeing the NHS as a deeply flawed organisation that will never have enough money, and not a national religion, the better
Half our beds are taken up by people recovered but stuck waiting on social care
Good point Malc. If Burnham can solve it all credit to him.
Hope you’re good Sir, and enjoying the summer
Taz, thanks , hope same for you. Not long back from Florida, was far too hot there at this time, 99 every day and baking. Still great time was had by all. Back grafting now and weather has been lovely here.
Catching up on Politics for the first time this week
Mrs BJ went into Theatres for ANOTHER major op aimed at stopping her Paraplegia turning into Quadriplegia
After the planned 4hr Op which lasted 11hrs we were told there was a further problem higher up that was going to mean a further op would be required. Thankfully a clearer MRI of the neck area clarified this wasnt the case so with time this op should see her arms retain there use.
Seems to me AB is doing well Darren Jones less so.
Early days but a positive change of direction is welcomed.
Keep it up Andy lad.
Sad to hear about Kevin Keegan and horrifying what happened to Ann Widdecombe.
Hopefully the wife is home by the weekend and the Non League football starts then too.
So happier less stressful times ahead hopefully
So sorry to hear, and yes, here's to things looking up for you both in a big way.
Some ideas here for the NHS to consider. The approach to bed numbers vs medics seems almost the diametric opposite of ours. Has anyone modelled the two systems to see which is more cost effective ?
Health care paradox: Korea achieves world-class longevity with fewest doctors among developed nations
Yet this longevity is supported by a strikingly lean clinical workforce.
Korea recorded just 2.6 practicing physicians per 1,000 people (including practitioners of traditional Korean medicine), the second-lowest ratio in the OECD after Costa Rica and well below the average of 4.0. Medical school graduation rates tell a similar story, yielding just 7.3 graduates per 100,000 residents compared to the international norm of 15.3.
To bridge this human gap, the Korean medical system relies heavily on capital-intensive infrastructure and high-volume patient turnover. The country boasts 12.5 hospital beds per 1,000 residents — nearly three times the OECD average — and leads the global bloc in diagnostic equipment, housing 46.7 CT scanners per million people.
This hyper-accessible infrastructure has fostered a culture of frequent clinical consultation. Koreans visited outpatient clinics an average of 17.9 times per year, nearly triple the OECD average of 6.6 visits and the highest rate recorded worldwide..
Inventing in equipment to improve productivity & quality at the same time. We have centuries of evidence, in a range of fields, that this works.
So you would imagine, but it would require a very large change in the way we currently run the NHS. How quickly/easily could you move in that direction, and what would be the cost ?
An implementing government would have to do it very quietly least they run into issues with NHS-staff-worship tendency that exists amongst chunks of the public.
The sooner we start seeing the NHS as a deeply flawed organisation that will never have enough money, and not a national religion, the better
Half our beds are taken up by people recovered but stuck waiting on social care
Good point Malc. If Burnham can solve it all credit to him.
Hope you’re good Sir, and enjoying the summer
Taz, thanks , hope same for you. Not long back from Florida, was far too hot there at this time, 99 every day and baking. Still great time was had by all. Back grafting now and weather has been lovely here.
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the response will be grist to his mill. 'There is zero evidence of *widespread* child sacrifice. Is there evidence of a modicum of child sacrifice? Is that OK? The 'zero' then looks dishonest, because whilst the zero clearly applies to the evidence, it is placed in a sentence where the subject is the child sacrifice. I didn't know there was any child sacrifice.
I'm not sure what any normal person would consider to be a "modicum" of child sacrifice ? But as far as N America is concerned, there isn't any such evidence.
Unless you accept Vance's term as a description of abortion. Which is what he intended.
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the response will be grist to his mill. 'There is zero evidence of *widespread* child sacrifice. Is there evidence of a modicum of child sacrifice? Is that OK? The 'zero' then looks dishonest, because whilst the zero clearly applies to the evidence, it is placed in a sentence where the subject is the child sacrifice. I didn't know there was any child sacrifice.
I'm not sure what any normal person would consider to be a "modicum" of child sacrifice ? But as far as N America is concerned, there isn't any such evidence.
Unless you accept Vance's term as a description of abortion. Which is what he intended.
Help me then - I had no idea he was referring to abortion. What did they do in that regard?
Linking back to a thread from yesterday, I'd like to suggest that if you want to shout 'wanker' at Farage you should do so from the upper deck of a bus rather than from a car you're driving. Another plus point for buses.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Concerning Lib Dems, they just need to hold what they've got. They don't need to be doing anything very much seat-wise to depress the Tory vote share and ability to win seats. A point Alastair also makes.
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
Should they not be trying to form a government at some point? Or is their last experience of having responsibility too scarring for them? Much more fun to be a small party carping from the sides.
The Lib Dem point is different from their effect on the Tories point. But it is a valid one in my view. The Lib Dems have worked out a modus operandi in pavement politics but it lacks ambition. There's a fair amount of talent in their ranks since the 2024 including MPs with previous careers in defence, health and social care, tech startups etc, which they aren't really deploying.
70-odd MPs and a guaranteed two PMQs for their leader, yet no-one knows what the LibDems are for other than wet photo-ops. Ed Davey should either improve his act or make way for someone who can enunciate a clear philosophy and deploy the Commons team to greater effect.
Not sure I agree with this. I think people know what they are voting for if they choose the Lib Dems just as much as those voting for other parties do. Kemi Badenoch inadvertently described the Lib Dem appeal when she dismissed them as nice people good at fixing the church roof:
They are not on Twitter, but they are in local communities. A typical Liberal Democrat will be somebody who is good at fixing their church roof. And, you know, the people in the community like them, they are like ‘Fix the church roof, you should be a member of parliament’. And they want to be nice. But actually, they’ve got lots of very silly and foolish ideas, along with, you know, being able to fundraise for a local community.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Increasing taxes (or removing relief) on vape shops and reducing it on pubs is smart retail politics. Vape shops have proliferated lately and I suspect are not generally popular.
I have to wonder though what reliefs are vape shops getting . . . And more importantly, why?
Of all the places to get relief, I would expect vape shops to be close to the bottom of the list.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
“Reform the ECHR/Refugee Convention or leave in 12 months”
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Concerning Lib Dems, they just need to hold what they've got. They don't need to be doing anything very much seat-wise to depress the Tory vote share and ability to win seats. A point Alastair also makes.
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
Should they not be trying to form a government at some point? Or is their last experience of having responsibility too scarring for them? Much more fun to be a small party carping from the sides.
The Lib Dem point is different from their effect on the Tories point. But it is a valid one in my view. The Lib Dems have worked out a modus operandi in pavement politics but it lacks ambition. There's a fair amount of talent in their ranks since the 2024 including MPs with previous careers in defence, health and social care, tech startups etc, which they aren't really deploying.
70-odd MPs and a guaranteed two PMQs for their leader, yet no-one knows what the LibDems are for other than wet photo-ops. Ed Davey should either improve his act or make way for someone who can enunciate a clear philosophy and deploy the Commons team to greater effect.
Not sure I agree with this. I think people know what they are voting for if they choose the Lib Dems just as much as those voting for other parties do. Kemi Badenoch inadvertently described the Lib Dem appeal when she dismissed them as nice people good at fixing the church roof:
They are not on Twitter, but they are in local communities. A typical Liberal Democrat will be somebody who is good at fixing their church roof. And, you know, the people in the community like them, they are like ‘Fix the church roof, you should be a member of parliament’. And they want to be nice. But actually, they’ve got lots of very silly and foolish ideas, along with, you know, being able to fundraise for a local community.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
Increasing taxes (or removing relief) on vape shops and reducing it on pubs is smart retail politics. Vape shops have proliferated lately and I suspect are not generally popular.
I have to wonder though what reliefs are vape shops getting . . . And more importantly, why?
Of all the places to get relief, I would expect vape shops to be close to the bottom of the list.
It will be small business relief because the business rates are below £x000 and they only have one premise.
I suspect a lot of money can be recovered by only allowing small business rates relief for sone users (although I suspect Burnham has accidentally created a whole set of worms)
Increasing taxes (or removing relief) on vape shops and reducing it on pubs is smart retail politics. Vape shops have proliferated lately and I suspect are not generally popular.
I have to wonder though what reliefs are vape shops getting . . . And more importantly, why?
Of all the places to get relief, I would expect vape shops to be close to the bottom of the list.
There are two types of game being played here.
Firstly is shops as a front for crime. The tenants commit the various crimes and pay an especially large rent to their bosses. Which washes the money nicely. In this case, all taxes are paid promptly.
The second is shops popping up to do business and then disappearing before bills/tax can be collected.
There are some attempts to do both at once, but that tends to attract Plod.
The reason that the first is common, is that it creates a strong impetus to do nothing - lots of taxes paid.
It is apparent that, with a little obfuscation, regulators and the police become powerless to do much. So various enterprises operate, fairly openly for years. When shut down, the criminals put their efforts into the parallel operations they are already running. They barely skip a beat.
Increasing taxes (or removing relief) on vape shops and reducing it on pubs is smart retail politics. Vape shops have proliferated lately and I suspect are not generally popular.
I have to wonder though what reliefs are vape shops getting . . . And more importantly, why?
Of all the places to get relief, I would expect vape shops to be close to the bottom of the list.
There are two types of game being played here.
Firstly is shops as a front for crime. The tenants commit the various crimes and pay an especially large rent to their bosses. Which washes the money nicely. In this case, all taxes are paid promptly.
The second is shops popping up to do business and then disappearing before bills/tax can be collected.
There are some attempts to do both at once, but that tends to attract Plod.
The reason that the first is common, is that it creates a strong impetus to do nothing - lots of taxes paid.
It is apparent that, with a little obfuscation, regulators and the police become powerless to do much. So various enterprises operate, fairly openly for years. When shut down, the criminals put their efforts into the parallel operations they are already running. They barely skip a beat.
Another issue is that the people responsible for enforcement are trading standard who have multiple issues
1) as secondary council spending their budget has been destroyed over the past 15 years (I was going to say decimated but I’ve heard of 70% budget cuts).
2) these people can be very violent and have equally violent mates so it’s not worth the hassle to deal with them - especially when you workload is already at 2-300% (see point 1).
OT - I wouldn't bet on a May 2029 election when there can be a June 2029 one. There won't be much of a local election left for May 2029 by then but Lab would be coming from a very low point and the RefUKers from a very high one
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the response will be grist to his mill. 'There is zero evidence of *widespread* child sacrifice. Is there evidence of a modicum of child sacrifice? Is that OK? The 'zero' then looks dishonest, because whilst the zero clearly applies to the evidence, it is placed in a sentence where the subject is the child sacrifice. I didn't know there was any child sacrifice.
I'm not sure what any normal person would consider to be a "modicum" of child sacrifice ? But as far as N America is concerned, there isn't any such evidence.
Unless you accept Vance's term as a description of abortion. Which is what he intended.
Help me then - I had no idea he was referring to abortion. What did they do in that regard?
I think he's referring to abortion being done now by woke libtards who are virtually the same as Aztec child sacrificers. Though since woke libtards are part & parcel of the civilisation brought to the Americas, I'm not sure where he's going with that one. Presumably hoping the Evangelicals will hear the dog whistle.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
The ECHR was created by Churchill
Equally what part of Europe is Canada/Australia in beyond the fact they pay to be part of Eurovision
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
“Reform the ECHR/Refugee Convention or leave in 12 months”
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
Hmm. The first is just saying leave ECHR in 12 months without a debate about its merits. There is zero possibility of the UK unilaterally demanding and getting significant revisions to the treaty, even if it knew what specific revisions it wanted.
O&G revenues to fund renewables doesn't make much sense either. It's hypothecation where energy sources are subsidised anyway. ie we're paying for them somehow or or other. Making electricity cheaper is a good goal. Ed Miliband has been doing some work correcting the previous government allowing costs to get out of control but not enough. Basically I think it's stop nuclear, which is the really big money sink - probably have to see Hinckley Point and Sizewell through to their (very) bitter ends, and finish up current wind projects. Investments from now on are batteries, grid upgrade and solar.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
Isn't that like saying it's perfectly possible to run a clean restaurant without being inspected by the council? Of course it is but it's also a good thing to have that checked and enforced. If Canada and Australia were within the scope of the ECHR it would be a good thing for them to be part of it too.
David Essex OBE @DavidEssexNews I hope you’re well, I’m in the states before we start the UK tour, I’m looking forward to it. I’m always struck by the patriotism of the Americans, stars and stripes fly proudly everywhere, strange in the UK we’re told to take our flag down. Veterans treated with total respect,
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
The ECHR was created by Churchill
Equally what part of Europe is Canada/Australia in beyond the fact they pay to be part of Eurovision
Created by Churchill and buried by the KCs of Garden Court Chambers.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
But we are in Europe and the ECHR while Australia and Canada are not. So chosing to leave the ECHR sends a pretty obvious signal. That may be the point in some minds but those minds are too under-developed to understand the message they are in fact sending.
A 'democratic, liberal Common Law nation' - is most certainly not what we would appear. 'A potential ally for China and Russia' - that's more to the point. Maybe that would be a good thing but I'm not convinced as easily as some here apparently are...
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
“Reform the ECHR/Refugee Convention or leave in 12 months”
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
Hmm. The first is just saying leave ECHR in 12 months without a debate about its merits. There is zero possibility of the UK unilaterally demanding and getting significant revisions to the treaty, even if it knew what specific revisions it wanted.
O&G revenues to fund renewables doesn't make much sense either. It's hypothecation where energy sources are subsidised anyway. ie we're paying for them somehow or or other. Making electricity cheaper is a good goal. Ed Miliband has been doing some work correcting the previous government allowing costs to get out of control but not enough. Basically I think it's stop nuclear, which is the really big money sink - probably have to see Hinckley Point and Sizewell through to their (very) bitter ends, and finish up current wind projects. Investments from now on are batteries, grid upgrade and solar.
Using taxes (or effective taxes) on fossil fuel usages to fund renewables has been done a number of times in various countries.
See the various emissions credits systems, for example.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
The ECHR was created by Churchill
Equally what part of Europe is Canada/Australia in beyond the fact they pay to be part of Eurovision
The ECHR as created by Churchill did not have a court and Parliament remained the final arbiter of how it was enforced.
Again being in Europe is utterly irrelevant. "But we are in Europe" has already lost one referendum, if you are incapable of forming any good reason why we need to be in the ECHR while Canada is fine outside, that does not reference our continent, then do not be shocked to lose again.
the prime minister said he would reduce the bus fare cap next year from £3 a journey to £2, funded mainly by changing international climate donations into repayable loans.
the prime minister said he would reduce the bus fare cap next year from £3 a journey to £2, funded mainly by changing international climate donations into repayable loans.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
But we are in Europe and the ECHR while Australia and Canada are not. So chosing to leave the ECHR sends a pretty obvious signal. That may be the point in some minds but those minds are too under-developed to understand the message they are in fact sending.
A 'democratic, liberal Common Law nation' - is most certainly not what we would appear. 'A potential ally for China and Russia' - that's more to the point. Maybe that would be a good thing but I'm not convinced as easily as some here apparently are...
That we are in Europe is irrelevant. We have already chosen to leave one set of European institutions.
If there is a good reason to be in the ECHR then give it. We are in Europe is not one.
the prime minister said he would reduce the bus fare cap next year from £3 a journey to £2, funded mainly by changing international climate donations into repayable loans.
On Andy Burnham’s coronation day, Sky News’ Beth Rigby mentioned on three separate occasions that she had also attended Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
Isn't that like saying it's perfectly possible to run a clean restaurant without being inspected by the council? Of course it is but it's also a good thing to have that checked and enforced. If Canada and Australia were within the scope of the ECHR it would be a good thing for them to be part of it too.
Why?
Putin's Russia in 2019 was a full member of the ECHR.
Would you rather be 2019 Russia or 2019 Canada/Australia?
OT - I wouldn't bet on a May 2029 election when there can be a June 2029 one. There won't be much of a local election left for May 2029 by then but Lab would be coming from a very low point and the RefUKers from a very high one
Then next rounds of local elections will be strange with various Shadow Elections taking place ahead of the end of the council reorganisation.
It is hard enough to get people to vote for councillors as it is. Getting them to vote for Shadow councillors will be even harder
the prime minister said he would reduce the bus fare cap next year from £3 a journey to £2, funded mainly by changing international climate donations into repayable loans.
On Andy Burnham’s coronation day, Sky News’ Beth Rigby mentioned on three separate occasions that she had also attended Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.
The only reason you haven't is because you went to a different college...
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
“Reform the ECHR/Refugee Convention or leave in 12 months”
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
Hmm. The first is just saying leave ECHR in 12 months without a debate about its merits. There is zero possibility of the UK unilaterally demanding and getting significant revisions to the treaty, even if it knew what specific revisions it wanted.
O&G revenues to fund renewables doesn't make much sense either. It's hypothecation where energy sources are subsidised anyway. ie we're paying for them somehow or or other. Making electricity cheaper is a good goal. Ed Miliband has been doing some work correcting the previous government allowing costs to get out of control but not enough. Basically I think it's stop nuclear, which is the really big money sink - probably have to see Hinckley Point and Sizewell through to their (very) bitter ends, and finish up current wind projects. Investments from now on are batteries, grid upgrade and solar.
Oh I don’t think they are workable or make much sense. But it’s the kind of thing that sounds positive and reasonable - Burnham-esque.
E.g. the business rates cuts for pubs. Almost all of that will be guzzled up by large overseas breweries, not your local landlord who will just see their rent go up even higher.
On Andy Burnham’s coronation day, Sky News’ Beth Rigby mentioned on three separate occasions that she had also attended Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.
Why did she feel the need to mention it at all? Sounds like some deep insecurities here.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
“Reform the ECHR/Refugee Convention or leave in 12 months”
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
Hmm. The first is just saying leave ECHR in 12 months without a debate about its merits. There is zero possibility of the UK unilaterally demanding and getting significant revisions to the treaty, even if it knew what specific revisions it wanted.
O&G revenues to fund renewables doesn't make much sense either. It's hypothecation where energy sources are subsidised anyway. ie we're paying for them somehow or or other. Making electricity cheaper is a good goal. Ed Miliband has been doing some work correcting the previous government allowing costs to get out of control but not enough. Basically I think it's stop nuclear, which is the really big money sink - probably have to see Hinckley Point and Sizewell through to their (very) bitter ends, and finish up current wind projects. Investments from now on are batteries, grid upgrade and solar.
Oh I don’t think they are workable or make much sense. But it’s the kind of thing that sounds positive and reasonable - Burnham-esque.
E.g. the business rates cuts for pubs. Almost all of that will be guzzled up by large overseas breweries, not your local landlord who will just see their rent go up even higher.
Will they? Most branded pubs are also restaurants and so are ineligible to this. Which is part of why it is so cheap to do, there will be many pubs not eligble here as they are pub restaurants.
Increasing taxes (or removing relief) on vape shops and reducing it on pubs is smart retail politics. Vape shops have proliferated lately and I suspect are not generally popular.
I have to wonder though what reliefs are vape shops getting . . . And more importantly, why?
Of all the places to get relief, I would expect vape shops to be close to the bottom of the list.
There are two types of game being played here.
Firstly is shops as a front for crime. The tenants commit the various crimes and pay an especially large rent to their bosses. Which washes the money nicely. In this case, all taxes are paid promptly.
The second is shops popping up to do business and then disappearing before bills/tax can be collected.
There are some attempts to do both at once, but that tends to attract Plod.
The reason that the first is common, is that it creates a strong impetus to do nothing - lots of taxes paid.
It is apparent that, with a little obfuscation, regulators and the police become powerless to do much. So various enterprises operate, fairly openly for years. When shut down, the criminals put their efforts into the parallel operations they are already running. They barely skip a beat.
Another issue is that the people responsible for enforcement are trading standard who have multiple issues
1) as secondary council spending their budget has been destroyed over the past 15 years (I was going to say decimated but I’ve heard of 70% budget cuts).
2) these people can be very violent and have equally violent mates so it’s not worth the hassle to deal with them - especially when you workload is already at 2-300% (see point 1).
Edinburgh’s transport system has been catastro-f*cked by a similar outfit on Princes Street. Hat tip to the excellent Minute who deep some serious investigative journalism shortly before the fire.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
“Reform the ECHR/Refugee Convention or leave in 12 months”
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
Hmm. The first is just saying leave ECHR in 12 months without a debate about its merits. There is zero possibility of the UK unilaterally demanding and getting significant revisions to the treaty, even if it knew what specific revisions it wanted.
O&G revenues to fund renewables doesn't make much sense either. It's hypothecation where energy sources are subsidised anyway. ie we're paying for them somehow or or other. Making electricity cheaper is a good goal. Ed Miliband has been doing some work correcting the previous government allowing costs to get out of control but not enough. Basically I think it's stop nuclear, which is the really big money sink - probably have to see Hinckley Point and Sizewell through to their (very) bitter ends, and finish up current wind projects. Investments from now on are batteries, grid upgrade and solar.
Oh I don’t think they are workable or make much sense. But it’s the kind of thing that sounds positive and reasonable - Burnham-esque.
E.g. the business rates cuts for pubs. Almost all of that will be guzzled up by large overseas breweries, not your local landlord who will just see their rent go up even higher.
Will they? Most branded pubs are also restaurants and so are ineligible to this. Which is part of why it is so cheap to do, there will be many pubs not eligble here as they are pub restaurants.
Honestly Burnham is remarkably good at this politics business.
Robert Jenrick accused of spreading doctored 'stop the boats' recording of Labour MP - as party blame Guido Fawkes
Reform UK posted a 'clip' of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year
A Labour minister has demanded an apology from Reform UK after Robert Jenrick shared what appears to be an edited audio clip of the MP speaking on small boat crossings.
Reform UK posted a clip of the newly appointed Immigration Minister, Bassetlaw MP Jo White, speaking to constituents last year.
In the clip, she appears to say: "I don't care if we stop the boats."
However, Ms White has since shared the extended version of the clip, in which she said: "I don’t care who will stop the boats… my number one priority is to stop those boats."
She hit back at the Reform UK Treasury spokesperson, writing "Reform have deliberately twisted my words to mislead the public. They should withdraw their false claim and immediately apologise."
Mr Jenrick said, in a now-deleted post, that Prime Minister Andy Burnham “clearly doesn’t give a stuff about stopping the boats”.
Despite this, when LBC contacted Reform UK about the audio, they laid blame at the door of anti-establishment political publication Guido Fawkes, who they say released the original clip.
A Reform UK spokesman said: “We’ve always trusted Guido Fawkes as a source of information, but perhaps on this occasion they didn’t get the full picture."
Labour MP Jonathan Brash has called on Mr Jenrick to resign over the apparently doctored video.
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the response will be grist to his mill. 'There is zero evidence of *widespread* child sacrifice. Is there evidence of a modicum of child sacrifice? Is that OK? The 'zero' then looks dishonest, because whilst the zero clearly applies to the evidence, it is placed in a sentence where the subject is the child sacrifice. I didn't know there was any child sacrifice.
I'm not sure what any normal person would consider to be a "modicum" of child sacrifice ? But as far as N America is concerned, there isn't any such evidence.
Unless you accept Vance's term as a description of abortion. Which is what he intended.
Help me then - I had no idea he was referring to abortion. What did they do in that regard?
Although Aztec elders dissuaded pregnant women from having abortions, it was generally believed in Aztec doctrine that life did not begin until “the droplet of a baby is already 3 (or) 4 months formed” (Florentine Codex VI, 141 and 152]. The Aztec believed that infants who died during labor traveled to a place called Chichiualcuauhco , where a wet-nurse tree would feed them with its milk. They would remain there until the gods sent them back to be born of another mother, and the cycle of birth and death turned once more.
In Aztec society, the life of the mother was always placed ahead than that of the fetus. Because Cesarean sections were not performed, if natural labor was obstructed and the mother’s life was at risk, the fetus was dismembered and removed.
Vance telling lies to support a greater ‘truth’, yet again. Bit of a blood libel vibe..
🚨 JD Vance is now claiming that when settlers arrived in the New World, they “found widespread child sacrifice” and that “Christian civilization ended the practice.”
Archaeologists and historians, including experts in North American Indigenous history, say this is a complete fabrication. There is zero evidence of widespread child sacrifice among First Nations.
This isn’t a slip.
It’s racist revisionism dressed up as patriotism. And it tells you exactly how far they’ll go to rewrite history to justify oppression. FOLLOW: @Trustintrump47
But the response will be grist to his mill. 'There is zero evidence of *widespread* child sacrifice. Is there evidence of a modicum of child sacrifice? Is that OK? The 'zero' then looks dishonest, because whilst the zero clearly applies to the evidence, it is placed in a sentence where the subject is the child sacrifice. I didn't know there was any child sacrifice.
I'm not sure what any normal person would consider to be a "modicum" of child sacrifice ? But as far as N America is concerned, there isn't any such evidence.
Unless you accept Vance's term as a description of abortion. Which is what he intended.
Help me then - I had no idea he was referring to abortion. What did they do in that regard?
Who the eff knows ? JD is just free associating; listen to the clip.
Alphabet beat on every headline number tonight. Revenue up 24%. Cloud up 82%. EPS of $9.11. But $6.26 of that EPS came from paper gains on Alphabet's Anthropic stake*, not from operations. Strip that out and operating EPS is about $2.85. Free cash flow went negative for the first time in Alphabet's history. Long-term debt more than doubled in six months. Stock buybacks dropped to zero. https://x.com/HedgieMarkets/status/2080035162906390756
*Actually Anthropic and SpaceX. But SpaceX is also likely way overvalued if they don't get Starship to work.
AI is here to stay, obviously. What's not obvious is the value being given to all of the companies spending tens of billions to try and dominate the market.
What's certain is that some of them will fail to do so.
The other problem is that when customers are charged more realistic prices, they might walk away.
They're already doing so, which is a problem as both OpenAI and Anthropic have enormous financial commitments that require constant, rapid growth to sustain. Despite AI's numerous problems the biggest issue was never technical, but financial. It just costs too much for the benefits it provides.
From a frankly hilarious thread about the polling "showing" that millionaire favour being taxed more, this bit is my favourite. What it shows is that rich folk are exactly the same as everyone else polled on tax: they're in favour of other people paying more.
Look what happens when (in the same poll!) you ask people at what point we should apply a wealth tax.
It turns out people with £1m in assets are against taxing people with £1m in assets.
I don't see anything that has suddenly made the Tories more competent, or looking more competent, since they were turfed out in 2024?
The only real change has been that Reform has been foolish enough to relieve the Tories of some of their most incompetent ministers, such that both of them risk being seen as not up to the job of government.
History suggests that when parties are decisively thrown out of government for negative reasons, it takes more than one GE before people forget and their reputation recovers. I see nothing different, this time.
I think Mr Meeks yesterday had a better analysis on the Tories - basically they have very few seats they can win and a lot of the seats they currently have are likely to be lost in the next election to the Lib Dems thanks to their shift to the right towards Reform.
Basically if Reform sits at 20% and Burnham consolidates the left wing vote (as he will) the Tories are doomed whenever the next election is..
My take on Meeks is that he is likely influenced to some extent by dislike of the Tories. The other take is that Badenoch is polling way ahead of the party and that gets more important at election time. Once again, those of us on PB, obsessed by test cricket, pizza, radiohead, F1, politics and betting tend to forget that the vast, vast majority of the country cares little for politics, and many cannot even tell you who is the leader of the Liberal Democrats. We should also remember that at the next election every seat starts from scratch. Yes there is an incumbency effect, yes local performance of councils and councillors matters and yes the activist base is important, but I think its simply wrong to say that there are very few seats where the Tories can win. Why? In 2019 they won many of them, and those voters can return.
I remember people saying the same thing in 2022-2024 when he was predicting an epochal defeat for the Tories.
Which is a totally fair point, but I think my point about leaders vs party ratings, and the general public is true too.
I wouldn't be surprised by (a) further Tory decline to sub 100 seats or (b) a modest recovery to near or just over 200.
Hard to see more than that.
If you look at Mr Meek's analysis he doesn't and I don't see any seats that the Tories don't already have where they have a chance of winning.
I think keeping 100 seats will take a miracle for the Tory party - and that's ignoring the current insane plan of removing anyone without the "right viewpoint" on a single issue - which when mentioned at an election will cost the Tory party some votes to the Lib Dems...
You need seats that are narrowly held by Labour, but
a) aren't nice enough to be Lib Dem b) are too nice and have too many people with actual jobs to go Reform.
There are a few, I suspect. Central London, some of the NW London fringes like Hendon and Finchley. There must be similar demographics elsewhere.
But not many.
Which I think is the effect @MoonRabbit identifies in her analysis: Milton Keynes, Trafford, plus the London fringes. Swindon maybe too much Reform. I think the effect also requires Labour to lose votes to the Greens.
The Barratt Home seats?
If Ref crashes then some of the ex-mining and steel seats (Balsover, Peniston) might be worth watching as well.
The other part of the Tories' wait for Reform to collapse calculation then kicks in. Will the dispossessed Reform voter switch to the Conservatives at that point? Andy Burnham seems keen to win them over and these are seats that voted Labour for a century. There's still plenty of muscle memory.
Kemi's unyielding right-wing posture and straight-talking schtik is designed to make her, and the party, palatable to trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country. You won't ever get the Lee Andersons back tho.
The Meeks prognosis is bleak, and has some truth to it, but Conservatives will be encouraged by Kemi's ratings - miles better than Farage's - and that the LibDems really don't seem to be doing much nationally. If the Home Counties middle classes want rid of Labour badly enough they will revert back to the Tories.
Trad Tories who have drifted to Reform. And who, at the end of the day, don't really see Reform as fit to run the country
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
+1 - if you don't trust Reform to run the country you are never going to be voting for Reform, so you are going to be reporting as one of those 18% who are voting Tory.
I think Badenoch's strategy is that when Reform collapses, voters who entirely thought Reform was fit to run the country have no choice but to vote Conservative instead.
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Is she not also coping (or trying to) with the loss of the centrist Tories, the one Nation Tories etc that Johnson gave the heave-ho to?
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
This is why Badenoch's ECHR stuff is politically inept... she is keeping the Lib Dems alive to eat the previously Tory shires...
I’d have thought ECHR is a minuscule issue compared with Badenoch’s views on the switch to electricity and renewables.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
The Tory ECHR policy is using a nuclear bomb to fix a single issue.
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
Piss off with this false dichotomy.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
The ECHR was created by Churchill
Equally what part of Europe is Canada/Australia in beyond the fact they pay to be part of Eurovision
Bart is OK with Israel carrying out ethnic cleansing, so obviously he's never going to be keen on the ECHR.
Comments
Not only is her insurance about to go up somewhat, she’ll also be in court shortly charged with undue care.
Suspect this intersection in the Venn diagram is small. ie Trad Tories who don't see Reform as fit to run the country are within the 19% that are sticking with the Tories in current polls and didn't drift to Reform in the first place.
We'll see.
The House of Representatives has passed the FY2027 NDAA (H.R. 8800), which includes the proposal to expand defense cooperation between the United States and Israel — including joint collaboration on military technologies, missile defense, cyber capabilities, data sharing, and research and development.
It now moves to the Senate for a final vote.
https://x.com/PopBase/status/2080039536927674407
Reform UK donor and Farage ally George Cottrell carried a fake Swiss passport under the name ‘Oscar Drewitt’.
Cottrell was hired under the name by the future Reform treasurer Mehrtash A’zami.
A’zami later vetted Cottrell’s mother's donations to Reform, now the subject of a police investigation
https://bsky.app/profile/adambienkov.bsky.social/post/3mrcqo7vltk2i
A Russian Su-57 fighter jet crashed on a training flight in Moscow oblast. The pilot survived. Some in Russia are claiming it was yet another example of friendly fire.
https://bsky.app/profile/chadbourn.bsky.social/post/3mrcqlnmsss25
Should add Labour has the same problem with Greens
That this might actually be her best strategy shows the dire straits the party is in. She's making two big assumptions: (a) Reform will collapse; (b) Reform voters will switch to the Conservatives when it does.
Using it as a source for actions is incompetent.
The guy I hit and his passenger went "argh my neck" and took my insurer for a (dubiously justified, I was nearly stationary by the time I actually made contact) £50k personal industry claim. Pc Plod looked at the size of the claim, decided it was a court job for due care, cost me 6 points and £500. Dread to think what the whole episode cost me in increased insurance premiums over the following 5 years.
Based on how I was treated for a genuine accident (I was focused on the vehicle I thought might try to ram me!), I'd hope they throw the book at her for that peice of gratuitous stupidty.
While many on the left hate the Tories, there is a strand of conservatism (small c) in the country. Sound money (stop laughing at the back), fiscal responsibility, self-reliance, state support for those in genuine need, defence of the realm, pro-business, small government.
That case can be made again, but the 14 years from 2010-2024 make it harder to say why.
I fervently believe that Farage is finally reaping what he has sown and that Reform is his latest vessel. May the ship go down with him. When it does (assuming it does) there will be plenty able to return to the Tories if they can be shown a valid reason.
Thanks for your insight. It’s always great to post online that you like something and some tedious self aggrandising blowhard comes along to rubbish it. Dunno what they get from it
The most elegant distillation of the rot at the heart of British society is the comments section of an article about the £2 bus fare cap being full of pensioners (who already get free bus travel) asking ‘anything for pensioners?’
https://x.com/jordanbhx/status/2080265196786884842
Lies are very useful in politics.
Blimey.
Highlights how deeply embedded the national sense of entitlement is, though.
Alphabet beat on every headline number tonight. Revenue up 24%. Cloud up 82%. EPS of $9.11. But $6.26 of that EPS came from paper gains on Alphabet's Anthropic stake*, not from operations. Strip that out and operating EPS is about $2.85. Free cash flow went negative for the first time in Alphabet's history. Long-term debt more than doubled in six months. Stock buybacks dropped to zero.
https://x.com/HedgieMarkets/status/2080035162906390756
*Actually Anthropic and SpaceX.
But SpaceX is also likely way overvalued if they don't get Starship to work.
AI is here to stay, obviously.
What's not obvious is the value being given to all of the companies spending tens of billions to try and dominate the market.
What's certain is that some of them will fail to do so.
Almost everyone sensible knows the current refugee system is insane for the 21st century. But a very large majority of people are pro-Green energy, Lib Dems even more so.
A lectern on a Rooftop overlooking the River Thames. A heavily scripted speech.
Totally ignoring the fact that Burnham is merely warming up the Country with a deries of 6am announcements in the ful knowledge that until the Autum Budget that's all he can do, totally ignoring the fact that Burnham wants to get power out of London and across all parts of the nation and basically trying to con the Conservative party and the rest of the Country that she has credible ideas that are funded. The £47bn plan is funded by what??. Has she actually told us how and when, other than abolishing any plan or project to net zero and basically taking benefits away from anybody, everybody.
We now here that a significant number of experienced One Nation Tories are being excluded from selection lists and in some cases the Conservative Party because they wont denounce Net Zero nor the ECHR on which thousands of every day British Rights are protected.
Poor old grant Shapps has been told to shove off, may be Michael Green will have better luck. She leads a Shadow Cabinet that in terms of ability makes Labour look "gold standard" and the cult of Kemikaze grows by the day, divine arrogance, absolute power, more tight wing and authoritarian by the day .
She may think she is out doing Farage, given at least as many of Farages wooly support is ex-Labout as it is ex-Tory and many of those in areas Burnham can and will touch , it seems the cul de sac of potential Tory voter support is narrowing by the week.
They say some politicians are lucky.
Burnham definitely is
He's not Starmer
Farage is on the wane
Badenoch is deeply deranged
Davey looks old and yesterdays man
Polanski is seeing his recent voter surge ebb and return back home.
May be we are in for an Autumn 2027 Election?
Your projection is peerless
But as far as N America is concerned, there isn't any such evidence.
Unless you accept Vance's term as a description of abortion. Which is what he intended.
Retired life is a blast
Another plus point for buses.
They are not on Twitter, but they are in local communities. A typical Liberal Democrat will be somebody who is good at fixing their church roof. And, you know, the people in the community like them, they are like ‘Fix the church roof, you should be a member of parliament’. And they want to be nice. But actually, they’ve got lots of very silly and foolish ideas, along with, you know, being able to fundraise for a local community.
https://www.politics.co.uk/news/2025/02/19/kemi-badenoch-says-lib-dems-not-on-twitter-but-they-are-in-local-communities/
It would add us to a list that contains just Russia and Belarus which isn’t really somewhere you want to be.
It’s also just a tick box exercise when comparing against Reform that will please reform favouring Tory voters but disgust Lib Dem tending ones.
Again what is Kemi doing beyond creating a Reform lite party that is still in no man’s land with no clear reason for existence
A: In cell.
I have to wonder though what reliefs are vape shops getting . . . And more importantly, why?
Of all the places to get relief, I would expect vape shops to be close to the bottom of the list.
“O&G revenues to fund renewables”
I think a large majority of people could support those variances on her policies.
It would add us to a list that contains Carney's Canada and Albanese's Australia.
Culture, law and traditions matter far more than geographic irrelevancy and we have far more in common with civilised, rule of law obeying, democratic Common Law Canada and Australia than we do authoritarian, dictatorial undemocratic Belarus and Russia.
If you think the ECHR is a good idea find a good reason to defend our membership of it. We are in Europe while Canada is not is not a good reason.
It is perfectly possible to be a democratic, liberal Common Law nation out of the ECHR.
I suspect a lot of money can be recovered by only allowing small business rates relief for sone users (although I suspect Burnham has accidentally created a whole set of worms)
Firstly is shops as a front for crime. The tenants commit the various crimes and pay an especially large rent to their bosses. Which washes the money nicely. In this case, all taxes are paid promptly.
The second is shops popping up to do business and then disappearing before bills/tax can be collected.
There are some attempts to do both at once, but that tends to attract Plod.
The reason that the first is common, is that it creates a strong impetus to do nothing - lots of taxes paid.
It is apparent that, with a little obfuscation, regulators and the police become powerless to do much. So various enterprises operate, fairly openly for years. When shut down, the criminals put their efforts into the parallel operations they are already running. They barely skip a beat.
1) as secondary council spending their budget has been destroyed over the past 15 years (I was going to say decimated but I’ve heard of 70% budget cuts).
2) these people can be very violent and have equally violent mates so it’s not worth the hassle to deal with them - especially when you workload is already at 2-300% (see point 1).
Though since woke libtards are part & parcel of the civilisation brought to the Americas, I'm not sure where he's going with that one. Presumably hoping the Evangelicals will hear the dog whistle.
Equally what part of Europe is Canada/Australia in beyond the fact they pay to be part of Eurovision
O&G revenues to fund renewables doesn't make much sense either. It's hypothecation where energy sources are subsidised anyway. ie we're paying for them somehow or or other. Making electricity cheaper is a good goal. Ed Miliband has been doing some work correcting the previous government allowing costs to get out of control but not enough. Basically I think it's stop nuclear, which is the really big money sink - probably have to see Hinckley Point and Sizewell through to their (very) bitter ends, and finish up current wind projects. Investments from now on are batteries, grid upgrade and solar.
Essex by name...
David Essex OBE
@DavidEssexNews
I hope you’re well, I’m in the states before we start the UK tour, I’m looking forward to it. I’m always struck by the patriotism of the Americans, stars and stripes fly proudly everywhere, strange in the UK we’re told to take our flag down. Veterans treated with total respect,
https://x.com/DavidEssexNews/status/2079928063626809845?s=20
A 'democratic, liberal Common Law nation' - is most certainly not what we would appear. 'A potential ally for China and Russia' - that's more to the point. Maybe that would be a good thing but I'm not convinced as easily as some here apparently are...
See the various emissions credits systems, for example.
Again being in Europe is utterly irrelevant. "But we are in Europe" has already lost one referendum, if you are incapable of forming any good reason why we need to be in the ECHR while Canada is fine outside, that does not reference our continent, then do not be shocked to lose again.
The switch allows the government to borrow more against those loans without violating its borrowing rules. But some experts say it could leave people in the poorest parts of the world more vulnerable to the effects of the climate crisis.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jul/23/business-rates-to-be-cut-by-20-for-england-pubs-clubs-and-music-venues
Always read the small print.
If there is a good reason to be in the ECHR then give it. We are in Europe is not one.
Such shameless behaviour.
On Andy Burnham’s coronation day, Sky News’ Beth Rigby mentioned on three separate occasions that she had also attended Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge.
Putin's Russia in 2019 was a full member of the ECHR.
Would you rather be 2019 Russia or 2019 Canada/Australia?
It is hard enough to get people to vote for councillors as it is. Getting them to vote for Shadow councillors will be even harder
E.g. the business rates cuts for pubs. Almost all of that will be guzzled up by large overseas breweries, not your local landlord who will just see their rent go up even higher.
In Aztec society, the life of the mother was always placed ahead than that of the fetus. Because Cesarean sections were not performed, if natural labor was obstructed and the mother’s life was at risk, the fetus was dismembered and removed.
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-71538-4_2
JD is just free associating; listen to the clip.
What it shows is that rich folk are exactly the same as everyone else polled on tax: they're in favour of other people paying more.
Look what happens when (in the same poll!) you ask people at what point we should apply a wealth tax.
It turns out people with £1m in assets are against taxing people with £1m in assets.
People with £10m of wealth feel those with £250m should pay more tax...
https://x.com/DanNeidle/status/2080263936276938973