Election 2024

Apologies as I said I wouldn't post on this thread again but the talk of AR being PM makes me ask the question - won't Darren Jones have something to say when the time comes?
 
We’ve got Darren Jones as a future leader. Tony Blair has made a lot of money since being PM. Having said that he had put a lot of effort into projects about climate change etc. Unlike Thatcher who, after leaving office made money out of promoting cigarette sakes in third world countries. I think Iraq haunts him but if you listen to Alistair Campbell he goes to great lengths to explain the reasons why we went into that war.
 
Ian_Davies said:
I am clinging to the hope that Starmer is a pragmatist and he thinks he needs to appear to be one thing in order to get elected, but then actually be another thing in order to make a positive difference to most people's lives once governing.

I also think he senses an opportunity to put the Conservatives out of power for a generation and he will cross the bridge of facing a rising Populist force like Reform UK when he gets to it.

Like racing, politics is a game of opinion, but I think it's absolutely inaccurate to view Sunak and Starmer (hence Conservative and Labour) as two cheeks of the same backside.

Anyway, whatever his true nature, once in power, Starmer will come under a lot of pressure to be more radical than currently looks like being the case.
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My way of thinking too. One strategy to win an election but once in power gradually change things. No wiggle room with the cupboard bare. He will need to be radical to make any meaningful difference.
 
So what do you reckon can change? The country has the highest national debt ever, with it costing £102 billion a year in interest to service. At the same time the taxation burden (in all its forms) is the highest it’s ever been. At the same time public services are crumbling and require heavy investment. And yet with all this in the background people seem to want more and more with politicians making empty promises to do just that. God help any Government trying to sort out that lot.
 
One thing that needs to be done is to make us all healthier. Johnson promised something didn’t he but nothing came of it. Jamie Oliver tried to improve school meals but Teresa May wouldn’t talk to him. It all started with Thatcher selling off school playing fields. I know this is a long term thing but a lot of problems facing the country are a result of child poverty. Give me a child to the age of seven and all that. There are so many problems facing the country where do you start?
 
barjon said:
So what do you reckon can change? The country has the highest national debt ever, with it costing £102 billion a year in interest to service. At the same time the taxation burden (in all its forms) is the highest it’s ever been. At the same time public services are crumbling and require heavy investment. And yet with all this in the background people seem to want more and more with politicians making empty promises to do just that. God help any Government trying to sort out that lot.
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Clawing back some of the obscene profits of the oil, gas,utilitity and banking section might be a good place to start,then capping bonuses to reflect a fair wage for a good job done.
Afterwards pass a law to limit share dividends to a fraction of the amount re-invested.
Sorted.:D
 
The world has changed a lot since 1979.

Neither Harold Wilson nor Jim Callaghan were considered anything other than moderate in their day and yet nothing Jeremy Corbyn ever proposed came close to the progressive taxation in that 60s/70s era.

The money is there, alright, it's just it's in the hands of the uber wealthy and taxing the rich to give the poor better public services has gone out of fashion these last 45 years.

Apart from a social democrat pause under Tony Blair/Gordon Brown, it's been a steady march to the right my entire adult lifetime.

But like any piece of elastic, it can only be stretched so far.

Just how much richer do the rich want to be?

Starmer is saying what it takes to get elected and to win big, so a second term is all but assured.

Anyone who can't see that and thinks he's a Tory clone is in for a surprise, I reckon.

Once in power, I reckon Starmer might be the sort of PM John Smith would have been - not a socialist, but more radical than Blair was.

We shall see.
 
That's not even funny, walsworth - he'd better not!

Little movement from yesterday in betting market odds or the running BBC Poll of Polls, but with only 25 days to go now, that traditional late switch back towards the incumbent government needs to start happening soon if the Conservatives are going to emerge with a three-figure number of seats because right now it's looking beyond dire for them.
 
I've had that conversation - when you hear things like: "Hitler was a socialist, remember, his Party were called the National Socialists" you realise you're conversing with the residents of a pond and it's time to fetch your coat.
 
moehat said:
One thing that needs to be done is to make us all healthier. Johnson promised something didn’t he but nothing came of it. Jamie Oliver tried to improve school meals but Teresa May wouldn’t talk to him. It all started with Thatcher selling off school playing fields. I know this is a long term thing but a lot of problems facing the country are a result of child poverty. Give me a child to the age of seven and all that. There are so many problems facing the country where do you start?
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The selling off of playing fields has been one of the worst decisions ever made. No coincidence obesity is as bad as it is. Where I played my primary school football there used to be a huge field of football,rugby hockey, and cricket pitches. Now just two rugby pitches and two g4 pitches for football and hockey. Same all over edinburgh. Im sure its the same everywhere. Plus councils forced to shut community centres. Unfortunately folk are working longer hours to make ends meet so don't protest about it like they used to.
The tories have left the country in such a shit state and having somewhere to play or exercise is a dream for some. Plus indoor facilities extortionate. Perfect recipe for huge social and obesity crisis to prosper.
 
I go to a gym that used to be council run but now privately run. Having said that it’s still not expensive and they have a swimming pool, sauna etc. Next to it is a park and people are always playing football etc. There are running and cycling clubs. Give people access to these things and they will use them.
 
Having the people obese and generally unhealthy physically and mentally is part of the Tories' long-term plan for the country. People are ground down by their health issues and don't have the energy to protest. They die younger so won't be drawing their pension and ill health will lead to the NHS being totally overwhelmed to the point that it's easier to make the argument for private health care in order to line their pockets (since many Tory MPs and benefactors will have shares in these private healthcare companies.

The sooner we get them the fvck out of power the better it will be for each and every one of us, including Tory voters. The latter just won't see it that way even when things improve for them because the average voter believes that if they vote Tory it makes them believe they are from the middle classes to which they aspire to belong rather than 'working class' with all its negative connotations, and therefore higher up the social ladder.

(And mostly because they've been so brainwashed by the right-wing mass media.)
 
It’s a very good point you make, Dessie. I have thought similarly for years, that total bastards from working class backgrounds will never vote Labour, as they equate Labour with the “party of the poor”; and there is no way that these people are poor. They actually see the Tory party as aspirational, a party that allows individuals to get richer. It doesn’t matter that it is purely a short-term thing, and that making them richer makes someone else poorer - always a poorer person, in fact.

I have many arguments with these people.
 
Len Madeiros said:
It’s a very good point you make, Dessie. I have thought similarly for years, that total bastards from working class backgrounds will never vote Labour, as they equate Labour with the “party of the poor”; and there is no way that these people are poor. They actually see the Tory party as aspirational, a party that allows individuals to get richer. It doesn’t matter that it is purely a short-term thing, and that making them richer makes someone else poorer - always a poorer person, in fact.

I have many arguments with these people.
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"My parents didn't get where they were by accepting hand-outs."
 
Ian_Davies said:
With 26 days until Polling Day, Labour are back to 1.07 for an Overall Majority, but little other change other than the potential momentum of Reform UK causing them to shorten in the Most Seats market ....

Most Seats
Labour 1.03
Conservatives 44
Reform UK 75

Overall Majority
Labour 1.07
No Overall Majority 21
Conservatives 80
Reform UK 190

Conservatives to lose 201+ Seats: 1.15

Source: "The Machine"

Latest (7th June) BBC Poll Tracker
Labour 44%
Conservatives 23%
Reform UK 13%
Liberal Democrats 10%
Green 6%

Electoral Calculus User-Defined
Seats Prediction Based On Above
Labour 497
Conservatives 72
Liberal Democrats 43
Green 2
Reform UK 1

Labour Majority: 344
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With 25 days to go to Polling Day the betting is virtually unchanged but the rolling updates BBC Tracker Poll Of Polls suggests things are getting even worse for the Conservatives....

Most Seats
Labour 1.03
Conservatives 48
Reform UK 85

Overall Majority
Labour 1.06
No Overall Majority 21
Conservatives 85
Reform UK 200

Conservatives to lose 201+ Seats: 1.17

Source: "The Machine"

Latest (8th June) BBC Poll Tracker
Labour 44%
Conservatives 22%
Reform UK 13%
Liberal Democrats 10%
Green 6%

Electoral Calculus User-Defined
Seats Prediction Based On Above
Labour 509
Conservatives 58
Liberal Democrats 46
Green 2
Reform UK 0

Labour Majority: 368
 
I assume this isn’t the Reform candidate that was fined £2,000 for kicking a dog but another one….
A Reform UK candidate claimed the country would be "far better" if it had "taken Hitler up on his offer of neutrality" instead of fighting the Nazis in World War Two.
Ian Gribbin, the party's candidate in Bexhill and Battle, also wrote online that women were the "sponging gender" and should be "deprived of health care".
In posts from 2022 on the Unherd magazine website, seen by the BBC, he said Winston Churchill was "abysmal" and praised Russian President Vladimir Putin.
A Reform spokesman said the comments were not "endorsements" but "written with an eye to inconvenient perspectives and truths", while his remarks about women were "tongue in cheek".
Mr Gribbin declined to comment.
In July 2022, Mr Gribbin posted on the Unherd website: "Britain would be in a far better state today had we taken Hitler up on his offer of neutrality…. but oh no Britain’s warped mindset values weird notions of international morality rather than looking after its own people."
The same month he wrote: "In Britain specifically we need to exorcise the cult of Churchill and recognize that in both policy and military strategy, he was abysmal."
The previous month he criticised women, writing on the site’s message board: "Do you think you could actually work and pay for it all too like good citizens?
"Men pay 80% of tax – women spend 80% of tax revenue. On aggregate as a group you only take from society.
"Less complaining please from the 'sponging gender'."
He added that women are "subsidised by men to merely breath (sic)".
In January 2022 he posted: "Men pay 80% of tax. Women take out 80% of expenditures.
"Square that inequality first by depriving women of healthcare until their life expectancies are the same as men, Fair’s fair."
In December 2021 he wrote female soldiers "almost made me wretch (sic)" and were a "total liability".
From the BBC website….
 
moehat said:
I assume this isn’t the Reform candidate that was fined £2,000 for kicking a dog but another one….
A Reform UK candidate claimed the country would be "far better" if it had "taken Hitler up on his offer of neutrality" instead of fighting the Nazis in World War Two.
Ian Gribbin, the party's candidate in Bexhill and Battle, also wrote online that women were the "sponging gender" and should be "deprived of health care".
In posts from 2022 on the Unherd magazine website, seen by the BBC, he said Winston Churchill was "abysmal" and praised Russian President Vladimir Putin.
A Reform spokesman said the comments were not "endorsements" but "written with an eye to inconvenient perspectives and truths", while his remarks about women were "tongue in cheek".
Mr Gribbin declined to comment.
In July 2022, Mr Gribbin posted on the Unherd website: "Britain would be in a far better state today had we taken Hitler up on his offer of neutrality…. but oh no Britain’s warped mindset values weird notions of international morality rather than looking after its own people."
The same month he wrote: "In Britain specifically we need to exorcise the cult of Churchill and recognize that in both policy and military strategy, he was abysmal."
The previous month he criticised women, writing on the site’s message board: "Do you think you could actually work and pay for it all too like good citizens?
"Men pay 80% of tax – women spend 80% of tax revenue. On aggregate as a group you only take from society.
"Less complaining please from the 'sponging gender'."
He added that women are "subsidised by men to merely breath (sic)".
In January 2022 he posted: "Men pay 80% of tax. Women take out 80% of expenditures.
"Square that inequality first by depriving women of healthcare until their life expectancies are the same as men, Fair’s fair."
In December 2021 he wrote female soldiers "almost made me wretch (sic)" and were a "total liability".
From the BBC website….
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This needs to be spread far and wide as representative of Reform UK. Nip the bastards in the bud.
 
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