General British politics discussion thread

Strazdas

Lots of Brexiteers and hard Brexiteers among these names - very few moderates or centrists.

ancapailldorcha

No sign of Priti Patel. Interesting...

Tom Mann Centuria

Shows how bereft of talent UK politics is when Dorries is tipped to retain her culture job, and Coffey is tipped for health.

Ahwell

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567718#Comment_119567718

I found it odd that she never came out to back Truss, she must of known that there wasn't going to be a place for her from very early on. Baverman is just bonkers, she has the potential to be an even more hateful Home Secretary than Patel was.

Sam Russell

At some funeral or such where all living Prime Ministers were in attendance, Macmillan was asked what the collective noun* would be for such a gathering of PMs. He thought for a millisecond and then pronounced - A Lack of Principals. I think for this list of possible cabinet members would be - A Lack of Talent.

*[Collective nouns was a pastime for Victorian underworked University Dons with little else to amuse themselves.]

VinLieger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119567658#Comment_119567658

Just thank god it wasn't the environment as had been suggested last week.

NI has always been a post for the tories where they put the people they don't care about but just need someone to do the job OR a punishment posting, I wonder which this one is..... im shocked he accepted tbh but maybe hes just gonna sit back and do even less than has been done by the tories in NI up until now which Liz is probably aware of and likely okay with.

pixelburp

This is where the crisis has head; the proposal of "warm banks" for people who can't afford the bills to heat themselves at.home.

I honestly can't decide if this is an obscene dehumanisation of the Poor and their needs, or a desperate attempt to help from those incapable of imaginative thinking. The name alone is gross, emphasising how "... Bank" has become normalised.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-derbyshire-62758170

ArmaniJeanss

Theresa Coffey - Health would be a funky choice if that list above is correct. Especially with the existence of that famous wild-eyed photo of her with a whiskey in one hand, a cigar in the other and alcohol stains down her t-shirt. She looks shockingly unhealthy for a mere 50-year-old woman. It brings to mind that scene in Yes Prime Minister where a wheezy chain smoking obese man ends up in Health, though that was satire.

Other than that the absence of Kemi Badenoch & more so Penny Mordaunt seems curious. The latter clearly had a lot of support both within the MPs and the membership. So potentially a Truss administration starts with two MPs on the backbenches (Mordaunt and Sunak) who got 240 MPs votes between them. Maybe Mordaunt will be content with a junior non-cabinet role?

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119568914#Comment_119568914

Badenoch is a nobody. She got her 5 minutes of Fame running for the leadership and will now be packed away until Truss says something racist and needs to do a Sepp Blatter.

Ahwell

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119568914#Comment_119568914

That is the first of 18 tweets. Badenoch and Mordaunt are mentioned later - "Kemi Badenoch is tipped by most people to be education secretary...", "Penny Mordaunt, hotly tipped to be party chairman, I'm told is unlikely to do that role. Indeed, the word is she has already turned down two posts...I've now been told that the other job Mordaunt was offered and rejected (in addition to chairman) was Northern Ireland".

Igotadose

It's just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, though. There'll be the announcement Monday, something about a Cabinet in the following days, then... NIP! Rwanda! And, some raft of new scandals will surface.

UK is taking it in the shorts and nothing will substantially change till the next election. Imagine if there's a ceasefire in Ukraine, what other shiny objects will the Tories and their media use next to distract the hoi polloi from their daily miseries? Far as I can tell, none of the current strikes show signs of settling, either.

Sam Russell

There is also the 'Enough is enough - Can't pay, wont pay' protest will gather momentum and could be as big an issue as the Poll Tax protest turned out to be.

If it does grow, it will be toxic for the Tory Party and the Gov.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119569169#Comment_119569169

With the amount of discontent out there the next 6 months in the UK could end up looking like a 1980s Reeling in the Years episode.

pixelburp

Well, at least Truss is being open about leaning into Trickle Down Economics; she's not even trying to present a human angle. It's all growing economy, not society.

Shown calculations setting out that her planned reversal of a recent rise in national insurance would benefit top earners by around £1,800 a year, and the lowest earner by about £7, and asked if this was fair, Truss said: “Yes, it is fair.”

She said: “The people at the top of the income distribution pay more tax, so inevitably when you cut taxes, you tend to benefit people who are more likely to pay tax.

“But to look at everything through the lens of redistribution, I believe, is wrong. Because what I’m about is growing the economy. And growing the economy benefits everybody.

And sure enough, goodbye pesky EU worker protections, all in a style also eerily similar to US Republicans' whole "right to work" agenda. And still the poorest won't be able to keep their heads above water, no matter how many days they're "free" to work.

However, on Saturday, the Times said she wanted to remove some EU-based workers’ protections, for example on the length of the working week, and entitlements to holidays.

Truss has made plain her desire to change the UK in this sort of broad direction, based on lower tax and a smaller role for the state.

“Our economy is not as competitive, dynamic and productive as it could and should be,” she wrote. “It takes too long to get things done: often businesses and families feel like they are wading through treacle. Our tax burden is too high. We need to prioritise reforms to get the economy moving and attract business investment.”

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/sep/04/liz-truss-energy-prices-action-plan

PommieBast

@pixelburp

I honestly can't decide if this is an obscene dehumanisation of the Poor and their needs, or a desperate attempt to help from those incapable of imaginative thinking. The name alone is gross, emphasising how "... Bank" has become normalised.

Yep definately. Having returned to the UK after a decade away the ubiquiti of food bank collections was one of many things that shocked me but my parents' didn't bat an eyelid.

Tom Mann Centuria

It's the sheer number of rough sleepers that gets me when I'm home in England. Even pre brexit walking through Town in the morning every shop doorway had someone in. I know it's not unique to UK but the amount is staggering compared to the dozen or so, six or seven years ago and one or two from when I was at school. It's how it's all been normalised is terrifying, and gets ever nearer to how films portray dystopia.

Strazdas

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119570243#Comment_119570243

Apparently US cities have gone the same way - rough sleepers everywhere (seems to be a recurring theme in countries where you have a huge gap between rich and poor).

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119570273#Comment_119570273

The US was always way worse from what I have seen. I was shocked at the amount of rough sleepers in places like D.C. 20 years ago. With the US it's down to a complete lack of "communist" social housing and unemployment benefits.

ancapailldorcha

That's the Tory party in a nutshell. They trot out tired old buzzwords without a clue how growth works. The Economist are running a series of articles on the subject at the moment. They're quite interesting. They also did a briefing on the golden triangle, a cluster of biotech companies in London, Oxford and Cambridge.

The article discussed the limitations on the triangle area, namely infrastructure, productivity and housing. People can't afford to live there, they can't commute about it efficiently, the companies struggle to fulfil their staffing needs for some reason and raising capital is a problem.

Decades of austere laissez-faire economics have been calamitous and we're now seeing the effects of a weak state unable to fulfil its role in a crisis. Every problem can be solved with more austerity and more handouts for Tory donors and never is this Conservative party orthodoxy challenged.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119570388#Comment_119570388

The the Tories are the steady hand when it comes to the economy.

Labour will wreck it 🤔

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119570273#Comment_119570273

If minimum wage had increased at the same rate as the rate of inflation since the 1970's, it would be $25/hour now. Instead, it's still at $7.25 and has been for 13 years.

I think we're reaching a defining period of attitude towards capitalism. Conservatives in both the US and UK clearly state that a fairer system of voting (such as proportional representation) will mean that they will take a massive beating in the polls and so they are doing everything they can to claw on to the power they have not democratically earned. Ongoing (and growing) climate crises can no longer be ignored and conservative voices that claim there is no evidence of it (like Julia Hartley Brewer in UK this past week, or Ted Cruz in US) will look increasingly out of step with reality.

Unfortunately though, this period could take 10-20 years before we see meaningful change on factors that could potentially significantly overcome the root cause of the issues being suffered and at all times, the conservative empty promises that there is nothing but sunlit uplands ahead if they are given a chance again will be too easily heard.

ancapailldorcha

Johnson's legacy. As usual, Led By Donkeys have done it again:

https://twitter.com/ByDonkeys/status/1566339776214614018

As usual, stellar work from them perfectly surmising the squalid and tawdry litany of corruption and indulgence that Johnson calls a legacy.

Shelga

Did anyone catch Joe Lycett’s appearance on the new Laura Kuenssberg Sunday morning show today? I think some poor booker is going to get an earful from Laura 😂

https://twitter.com/beardedgenius/status/1566349321750171648?s=21&t=jR5YW-WofB4PTW2X8f1CNQ

He made me laugh out loud. It’s all so horrifying, grim and overwhelming, and the servile treatment of Truss by Kuenssberg is so embarrassing in the face of that. This is a government who has destroyed the social fabric of the UK over the last 12 years. I really don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that. Joe Lycett brilliantly holds a mirror up to how inane these stupid shows are, and how stupid one would have to be to actually hold the opinions he’s espousing here.

Headshot

My God how the **** does Laura Kuenssberg have her own show now? BBC really scraping at the bottom of the barrel

hotmail.com

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119571868#Comment_119571868

I was expecting that to be more funny.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119571868#Comment_119571868

Pretty funny but how fking bland do the rest of them have to be to sit and listen to it. You would think the host would tell him to cop on but I suppose she is useless.

amacca

I thought it was funny.....There's no point in debating flunkies and paid mouthpieces seriously, they are part of the problem imo.

It's a symptom of how messed up the situation is that something like this is a valid response.

Strazdas

I found the Lycett appearance very funny. He was mocking Truss and the Tories of course, but he was also mocking the Daily Mail and their pathetic "all comedians are lefty woke liberals". It was an amusing of satire to go on the show against this backdrop and announce to Kuenssberg "I'm very right wing and I love and admire Liz Truss" (apparently he kept up this persona for the entire show).

This clip gives more context to his satire today :

https://twitter.com/knowlewester/status/1566346154136293377

Capt'n Midnight

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/sep/03/leave-eu-liquidation-brexit-arron-banks

"the decision by Banks to apparently write off £7,051,987 in loans to Leave.EU will attract most controversy after years of speculation over the source of his funding to the EU referendum campaign."

So much for following the money.

Brussels Sprout

57% for Truss. That's a good deal shy of what Johnson got 3 years ago.

I suspect that Sunak may leave politics altogether now.