Paid Members Lion_of_the_Midlands Posted June 16 Paid Members Share Posted June 16 It's a strange scene from the new Doctor Who but I'm sure it will be resolved in the end.  Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members FLips Posted June 16 Paid Members Share Posted June 16 More of the same from Kuenssberg's show this morning. I thought Wes Streeting, though he has the dead-behind-the-eyes Dexter Lumis stare going on, was a very good talker and for the most part stuck to talking about Labour and their policies, even giving credit to the Lib Dems and others which is refreshing. Mark Harper was the opposite. Cagey and defensive, spoke more about Labour and Reform because every time he spoke about the Tories he would get fact checked and shot down. It was nice to hear from Ed Davey who was rightly confronted about his stunts and perhaps not being taken seriously, which is one of my concerns as well. I know he talks about policies at these stunts, but that's not what people see or remember. He also struggled, as Labour and Tories have, with direct questions about his failings, talking around the question rather than answering it. Rhun did OK as always but his time was shorter than the others so it was mainly the same points he's made on the BBC Radio interview yesterday. He was pressed on Welsh Independence though more than other interviews I've seen but I think he gave a good answer. He wants it, why it makes sense to him, but this election isn't the time for it. The panel was pretty good too. Andy Burnham seemed a very open and good talker, though those from the Greater Manchester area will have to let me know if he's really that good, even Nadine Dorries wasn't as Pro-Tory as you'd expect. She was mostly fair and critical, but couldn't quite shake those Tory manners as she found herself interrupting other people and talking over them for little reason. Moment of the show was Brian Cox saying that Nigel Farage was a fascist and panicking Laura Kuenssberg a bit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Healys Chutney Spoon Posted June 16 Share Posted June 16 Nadine is awful. Just awful. The brown-nosing of Boris was/is so cringeworthy. Which Brian Cox - actor or science bloke? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members FLips Posted June 16 Paid Members Share Posted June 16 44 minutes ago, Tim Healys Chutney Spoon said: Nadine is awful. Just awful. The brown-nosing of Boris was/is so cringeworthy. Which Brian Cox - actor or science bloke? Actor. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donald J Trump Posted June 16 Share Posted June 16 8 hours ago, FLips said: It was nice to hear from Ed Davey who was rightly confronted about his stunts and perhaps not being taken seriously, which is one of my concerns as well. I know he talks about policies at these stunts, but that's not what people see or remember. He also struggled, as Labour and Tories have, with direct questions about his failings, talking around the question rather than answering it. As cheap and as obvious as the tactic of attention grabbing stunts are, it's a bold strategy. If it doesn't pay off and Lib Dems fail to make real progress, spending the campaign prat falling like Norman Wisdom is going to make Ed Davey look like an even bigger clown than the campaign capers have. It seems slightly desperate though, and a sign that they lack confidence in their ability to cut through. This should be easy pickings for the Lib Dems. The Tories are dead and reform are splitting the vote, while even lifelong Labour supporters aren't totally sold on Starmer. When you consider that their relatively small share of the vote is significantly more efficient than other parties, and that they're starting from such a low mark, anything less than serious progress would be a disaster. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Lion_of_the_Midlands Posted June 16 Paid Members Share Posted June 16  Now I may be getting old, but what the actual fuck is going on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
westlondonmist Posted June 16 Share Posted June 16 6 minutes ago, Lion_of_the_Midlands said:  Now I may be getting old, but what the actual fuck is going on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SuperBacon Posted June 16 Author Members Share Posted June 16 As someone who lives near and often works in one of those towns, I'd be incredibly surprised if she loses her seat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members garynysmon Posted June 16 Paid Members Share Posted June 16 (edited) On 6/13/2024 at 4:29 PM, FLips said: There needs to be a serious re-think of the way politics is presented as a country anyway. We're stuck in a two-party system with rarely any deviation from. The issue you have is that it won't change for as long as the two main parties that swap power between them are the main beneficiaries of that system. It creates a situation where the Conservatives have for years succeeded in hoovering up the right /right of centre vote due to the left of centre options being more fractured, but also where the Labour are perpetually using emotional blackmail on voters of those smaller left of centre parties to 'lend' them their votes. But this is the type of borrowing where its never, ever returned. I really do think Labour will do worse in Wales than the rest of the UK. This is the midway point of a particularly unpopular Welsh Government in Cardiff Bay, led by a particularly unappealing First Minister who secured his position by very questionable means. Schemes like 20mph weren't implemented as well as they could have been and health is a mess. I do see Labour re-capturing the old 'red wall' seats in the north east but may not succeed in capturing seats like Ynys Mon (3 way Plaid/Tory/Lab marginal) and Carmarthen (Plaid/Lab marginal), despite being extremely winnable if uniform national trend is your barometer. Ynys Mon is a particularly bonkers seat. A Plaid Cymru run council with a 10,000 majority by Rhun ap Iorwerth in the equivalent Senedd seat but a Tory seat in Westminster (despite not a single Tory local councillor) on around 35% of the vote due to Plaid/Labour support splitting almost exactly down the middle. Edited June 16 by garynysmon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tim Healys Chutney Spoon Posted June 17 Share Posted June 17 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cw880334dgyo  Reform candidate is a racist....whoddathunkit? He was meant to stand in my constituency. Kemi Badenough will retain her seat, sadly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members JNLister Posted June 17 Paid Members Share Posted June 17 A sign of just how old the Conservative vote is skewing: some pollsters are worrying they aren't going to get accurate results unless they split their "over 65s" category (for checking the sample is representative and weighting as necessary) into 65-74 and over 75s. The problem is that if you just do it by over 65s, most of the people who respond (particularly in online polls) will be nearer to 65 and that could mean under-representing the Tory support among the really really really old folk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members FLips Posted June 17 Paid Members Share Posted June 17 (edited) The Reform UK Manifesto/Contract came out today. I missed the press conference as I was working from the office today but reading through the document now and it's absolutely wild. There's the "crowd pleasers" in there as you'd expect; stronger immigration policies, raising tax thresholds, loads of money to the NHS, etc. The issue with Reform is everything in there is smeared with racist intentions, or outright bonkers. Stronger immigration includes gathering people up and dumping them on the shores of France, money to the NHS actually means closing the NHS down and replacing it with a new system, which if it was anyone but the bullshitter Farage was behind it could have some potential. They also want to scrap green energy completely to fund a lot of it and basically destroy the country with fracking and oil and coal mining. There are some lesser known policies that I do agree with though, such as offering 2 year Uni courses and scrapping interest on student loans, app restrictions for children, an inquiry into the harms of social media, giving the choice to pay your TV license, and prioritising building on brownfield sites. All their main big policies though are either spiteful or outright unbelievable to anyone with common sense lies. There's some really mad stuff in there too including this Quote A Patriotic Curriculum in Primary and Secondary Schools Any teaching about a period or example of British or European imperialism or slavery must be paired with the teaching of a non-European occurrence of the same to ensure balance. Basically anything negative about Britain must be countered with a "yeah but what about..." argument. Bizarre. They also want to ban any queer discussions in school and out the kids to their parents if they're caught doing it, ban "woke" speech, free speech and "unpatriotic" speech. They also want to give a load more power to landlords and to the police and as we all know ACAB and combined with all the mad new things they want to enforce such as removing the right to protest would be a nightmare. The entire document is basically as though they put it together and realised "oh shit nobody is going to vote for Nazi Germany 2: Brexit Boogaloo, how can we appeal to all the non-fascists?" and gave us all tax breaks and regurgitated the old Brexit slogans to save the NHS. Awful people with an awful manifesto that was made for thickos and racists. As with all the manifestos so far as well the IFS have crunched the numbers to see if the maths add up and whereas with the other parties there has been an almost polite "they're almost there but we're not sure", for Reform they've outright went "this won't work". To the surprise of nobody. Quote The Institute of Financial Studies (IFS) is dubious about whether Reform UK’s figures and ambitions add up. Commenting on the party’s proposals for tax cuts and spending increases, Carl Emmerson, deputy director at the IFS, said the party's sums "do not add up" and that the "package as a whole is problematic." "Spending reductions would save less than stated, and the tax cuts would cost more than stated, by a margin of tens of billions of pounds per year. Meanwhile the spending increases would cost more than stated if they are to achieve their objectives," he said. Despite the large spending increase for the NHS of £17bn per year, Emmerson said it would "not be nearly enough to meet Reform’s incredibly ambitious commitment to eliminate waiting lists within two years".  Edited June 17 by FLips Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BigJag Posted June 17 Paid Members Share Posted June 17 The Healthcare hustings scheduled for Islington North have been cancelled. Largely due to Labour refusing to attend. The private healthcare executive that will be standing for Labour. Looks to lack much of a backbone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SuperBacon Posted June 17 Author Members Share Posted June 17 1 hour ago, FLips said: giving the choice to pay your TV license, You mean it's NOT currently a choice? News to me Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Lion_of_the_Midlands Posted June 17 Paid Members Share Posted June 17 One of the few bonuses of having to look after someone over 75. Free TV license that you lot pay for. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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