Danny
Member
Posts: 9,861
|
Post by Danny on Jan 15, 2024 19:36:53 GMT
It's now established that acute Covid infection produces a range of long term symptoms in a large number of people, yes indeed, it createes a decent immune response in almost everyone who catches it. But as to serious illness, have you not noticed we have gone back to normal, business as usual, bit of winter illness? Maybe some now is covid instead of other stuff, but thats life. What seems to be in play here is that if you are partiularly susceptible to covid, then your chance of getting another significant infection are rather higher than average. Those people most susceptible to covid are the ones most likely to catch it badly again, and again. And the longer this goes on, then the process will whittle away the healthiest of these people as they gradually fall immune. Leaving only the sickest to get repeat infections, and obviously have the worst outcomes. The question is, do repeat infections make you more susceptible to covid, or does being susceptible to covid cause you to have repeat infections? Good you recognise that. But are you espousing restoring the doctors 35% paycut? And topical today, we cannot get enough sailors to man our navy, presumably because we are not paying them enough either. Grant Shapps today made a speech saying the peace dividend was over. Its a shame that believing that, he isnt prepared to provide the necessary funding. But instead is leaving the problem for labor to fund it after the election, after con has near bankrupted the nation with 14 years of misrule. Sounds awfully like working in an office might be one of them, as many of us do these days. We simply dont get enough exercise. What? You think it is disgraceful that doctors ration care treating those who need it most? I think it disgraceful if they did not! Its a national disgrace the government spent sooooo much money on forced lockdowns, and then said it had no money for conventional NHS treatment which is very clearly more cost effective in saving quality life years. Alec, you need to get a grip here, labour isnt intending to spend more on the NHS either. Doctors MUST ration what they have. We must never allow politicians to squander so much money again in the name of saving lives but actually killing people slowly as happened with lockdowns.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jan 15, 2024 19:40:24 GMT
But this idea that a centrist third party like the Lib Dems has no right to be co-operating with a centre right party, even to the extent of helping them govern in minority, in a parliamentary democracy, is utter nonsense. It is-but surely if PR really is about representation of all opinion, then it wouldnt matter if LDS were LOC & went into coalition with ROC. Indeed it would be the desired outcome of a voting system designed to produce representative government. And isn't this the test really-do these L to R coalitions actually produce stable government which achieves for all citizens ? If not , what is the point of it all ? You might as well stick with Big Tent parties and know what you are voting for . At least the manifesto for government gets published before you vote. I must say to the extent that continental coalitions are the product of PR systems being proposed, I dont think they are great adverts at the moment. Germany in particular:- www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/15/the-guardian-view-on-germanys-far-right-its-penetrating-the-mainstreamwww.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/15/thousands-tractors-block-berlin-farmers-protest-fuel-subsidy-cutsbut also the shaky government in Spain-and the absence of one in Netherlands still. It seems to me that the key ingredient for successful government is neither Big Tent internal coalitions , nor Multi Party cobbled together coalitions. It is great leadership. And that's what we lack-on both sides of the Atlantic.
|
|
Danny
Member
Posts: 9,861
|
Post by Danny on Jan 15, 2024 19:49:11 GMT
The point is that the LDs are not to be trusted. They must be held as complicit in much of the human wickedness of the Tory years. The point is, if you consider libs to be so bad, then I am surprised you are chatting here instead of out burning the homes of conservative MPs! Libs were mostly tricked into supporting con. Are you really blaming the victim instead of the perpetrator? And for that matter, you might consider its fair game for one political party to trick a rival into stupid mistakes. Its the policies of the conservative party which are so objectionable. Broadly to be summarised, as dismantle all state services and transfer as much national wealth as possible to those already the richest.
|
|
Danny
Member
Posts: 9,861
|
Post by Danny on Jan 15, 2024 20:05:28 GMT
The controversy now is over the **EXPANSION** of ULEZ to cover a vastly wider area, which the Conservatives most certainly do not favour! It was reported here on UKPR that Khan was required by central government to support expansion of the charging zone as a condition of increasing the grant to London transport, when it was going bust because of covid lockdowns and resulting drop in passengers. So firstly, it was conservative policy coming from government, but secondly he gave in to their blackmail. This weekend I happened to be chatting to a youngster about how life has changed in the last 40 years. We got onto the underground, where I noted it is noisier and the seats less comfortable. I'd guess its got fewer particulates than in the days of steam trains?
|
|
|
Post by isa on Jan 15, 2024 20:08:37 GMT
I think you may be suffering from self-deception there. As clearly significant as UKPR2 is, I don't see anything that could only have come from UKPR2 in that article. The most remarkable thing about this whole affair is how robust YouGov themselves have been in rubbishing the Telegraph's article. Nothing much I've seen elsewhere has said more than YouGov themselves have already pointed out. I'm sure most of you have read it already, but if not, go and read the "Notes on the Daily Telegraph’s analysis" here: yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/48371-yougov-mrp-shows-labour-would-win-1997-style-landslide-if-election-were-held-today
Clearly YouGov don't like their work being misrepresented by the Telegraph. Good on them.
Err, my remark was intended to be entirely tongue in cheek. I obviously need to brush up on my emoji skills. I agree completely with your second paragraph.
|
|
steve
Member
Posts: 12,307
|
Post by steve on Jan 15, 2024 20:10:45 GMT
"One of those consequences is that many LOC voters will not trust them again."
There is a certain element amongst the doctrinal left that thinks anyone who doesn't agree with them is a tory.
"Many" would be pushing that word to extremes.
I doubt whether they choose to vote liberal democrat or not the vast majority of Labour voters will be focussing on the events of more than a decade ago.
Of course the never lib dems in seats where they are the main alternative to the Tories enables the Tories. But given that they think they're all Tories any way probably doesn't occur to them.
|
|
|
Post by hireton on Jan 15, 2024 20:13:27 GMT
Unhappy times in the Tory Party:
|
|
|
Post by graham on Jan 15, 2024 20:15:43 GMT
The point is that the LDs are not to be trusted. They must be held as complicit in much of the human wickedness of the Tory years. The point is, if you consider libs to be so bad, then I am surprised you are chatting here instead of out burning the homes of conservative MPs! Libs were mostly tricked into supporting con. Are you really blaming the victim instead of the perpetrator? And for that matter, you might consider its fair game for one political party to trick a rival into stupid mistakes. Its the policies of the conservative party which are so objectionable. Broadly to be summarised, as dismantle all state services and transfer as much national wealth as possible to those already the richest. Tricked! Why did the LDs allow themselves to be tricked for five years? The party could have walked out of the Coalition - many excuses were available had they been sought. What did surprise me during the Coalition years was how docile the LD MPs were. Labour at least has the Tribune and Campaign groups and the Tories have ERG and various assortments of Right wing loonies seeking to put pressure on the Leadership. There was barely a peep from the LDs during that period.
|
|
|
Post by leftieliberal on Jan 15, 2024 20:35:29 GMT
Ben Walker in New Statesman on why Reform isn't gifting the election to Labour1. Most Reform voters will not vote for the Tories even if Reform does not stand a candidate (More in Common puts the Tory switchers at 25% and YouGov at 31%) 2. 12% of those who pay a high attention to politics say they will vote for Reform, but it is only 6% for those with mid level of attention and 3% for those with a low level of attention; for Labour the corresponding figures are 42, 44, and 53% respectively and for the Tories 25, 27 and 19% respectively. The polling may well be overestimating Reform support and underestimating Labour support. If you have many supporters who will turn out and vote for a donkey as long as it has a red rosette, they will do that regardless of what the polls say. For the Conservatives – the government of the day – to believe that they can deny Labour a majority by relying solely on anti-system Reform voters is not an improbable hope: it’s an impossible one.
|
|
neilj
Member
Posts: 6,046
|
Post by neilj on Jan 15, 2024 20:37:34 GMT
Polls since Christmas continue to show an increasing Labour lead
Delta Labour lead widens to sixteen points in the latest results from Deltapoll. Con 28% (-) Lab 44% (+2) Lib Dem 10% (-2) Other 18% (-1) Fieldwork: 12th - 15th January 2024 Sample: 2,136 GB adults (Changes from 22nd-29th December 2023)
Gap between Sunak and Starmer widens further
|
|
Danny
Member
Posts: 9,861
|
Post by Danny on Jan 15, 2024 20:45:53 GMT
But Danny , how many cars - petrol, diesel, whatever - only do 20,000 miles over their lifetime! I dont know. Do you? I can say however, that quite a few vehicles do a large mileage with one owner in a year or two and then very slowly gain mileage thereafter. This is not about whether we should build new electric cars or new petrol cars. Its about whether it makes sense to scrap part used petrol cars and replace them with new electic cars. The co2 investment in an old vehicle's manufacture probably means it would actually only be cost effective to scrap it if it will do 40,000 miles before it gets scrapped. This isnt a like for like comparison, but the situation in transitioning from old petrol vehicles to new electric ones. Thats petinent because much of the argument among ULEZ is exactly about forcing people to scrap old vehicles, which are likely to include many doing very low mileages, and therefore incur the penalty of building a new electric car to replace them. The original point was about whether it always makes sense to push ahead as fast as possible replacing fossil with electric, and it does not. It very often makes a lot more sense to use what you already built until it reaches the end of its lifespan. They seem to start off discussing an argument electric vehicles will never reach the claimed mileages before being scrapped. I didnt consider this point at all, though its true the web page I posted showed lifetimes going up to 250,000 miles, which sounded rather high for a petrol vehicle. Whether electric will get there, who knows because they have not existed that long. They will require new batteries if they do. Diesel vehicles seemed to produce about 10% less co2 than petrol, which was the justification for the drive to diesel. We now seem to have completely reversed that and are arguing its too small to justify them...So what counts as a significant saving? Dont forget, electric vehicles are actually heavier than petrol ones, so inherently less efficient on that score. However, Im not quibbling about that either, the issue is as you say, how green the grid is, and I was considering the UK because its our policy we are talking about. The UK does not have a very green grid. Maybe 25% power comes from renewables? So thats 75% of the notional reduction in CO2 is not being made? But worse than that, consider what would have happened had we not introduced electric vehicles at all. I dont see we would currently have any less renewables generation, constructing it wasnt predicated on use by electric vehicles. So what we really have is added demand for electricity for the new electric vehicles, which is going to be coming mostly from burning extra fossil fuels. Against that, we could have people charging their electric vehicles off peak when there is plenty of wind power with no other demand, but I honesty do not believe people are getting up at 2AM to do this. Especially since there are very few schemes in place to incentivise them by selling them cheap eletrcity at antisocial hours. So I strongly suspect the true amount of fossil electricity used by electric vehicles is well above the average percentage of power generated from fossil. Not clear this has happened yet....In fact you could argue thats part of the problem. Its assumed this would happen, but it hasnt. There is no quantity supply of cheap second hand electric vehicles. Again, I am pointing out what has happened thus far has probably INCREASED co2 emissions in the medium term. But there is no sign the UK is about to start generating enough electricty renewably to power all these cars, nor will it in 10 years and its dubious in 20 years, by which time the first of them will already have been scrapped. Never having saved any CO2. I'd like to see that demonstrated, because its not at all intuitively obvious. Googling I found a research paper which suggested the 'Well to wheel' efficiency of a petrol vehicle ranges from 11-27%, compared to electric vehicle powerd by gas power station 13-31%. ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2020SJRUE..24..669A/abstractI'd call that...about the same!
|
|
neilj
Member
Posts: 6,046
|
Post by neilj on Jan 15, 2024 20:46:31 GMT
Second tory Deputy Chair to rebel
|
|
Danny
Member
Posts: 9,861
|
Post by Danny on Jan 15, 2024 20:52:45 GMT
Tricked! Why did the LDs allow themselves to be tricked for five years? The party could have walked out of the Coalition I imagine for the same reason Boris Johnson was condoning parties at Dowing street during lockdown. By autumn 2020 he already had the proof lockdown was pointless, but it was politically impossible to admit that publicly. In private, he didnt care about the rules because he knew they were pointless. Similarly, after going into coalition for a year or so and seeing how they were being shafted, the libs could have walked away saying that made a terrible mistake, for which they would be blamed having admitted they made the mistake. Followed probably by a short delay to a new election in which the voters blamed them anyway for their stupidity fresh in everyones minds. As with lockdown, once it was done at all it was already to late to admit it was a stupid mistake.
|
|
|
Post by graham on Jan 15, 2024 20:59:51 GMT
Tricked! Why did the LDs allow themselves to be tricked for five years? The party could have walked out of the Coalition I imagine for the same reason Boris Johnson was condoning parties at Dowing street during lockdown. By autumn 2020 he already had the proof lockdown was pointless, but it was politically impossible to admit that publicly. In private, he didnt care about the rules because he knew they were pointless. Similarly, after going into coalition for a year or so and seeing how they were being shafted, the libs could have walked away saying that made a terrible mistake, for which they would be blamed having admitted they made the mistake. Followed probably by a short delay to a new election in which the voters blamed them anyway for their stupidity fresh in everyones minds. As with lockdown, once it was done at all it was already to late to admit it was a stupid mistake. The LDs did have the option of walking out of Cameron's Coalition with a view to teaming up with Ed Milliband and other smaller parties - ie an alternative Government could have been formed from that House of Commons. Moreover, there was nothing to stop individual LD MPs breaking away from the Coalition to sit on the Opposition benches. Had 12 - 15 MPs done that, quite a few would likely have survived in 2015.
|
|
|
Post by crossbat11 on Jan 15, 2024 21:04:37 GMT
colin"It is-but surely if PR really is about representation of all opinion, then it wouldnt matter if LDS were LOC & went into coalition with ROC. Indeed it would be the desired outcome of a voting system designed to produce representative government."
I think a representative voting system still retains the principle of majoritarianism and political compatibility. Governments are still formed on the basis of a majority being recognised and some element of political cohesion too. It's unlikely for political antagonists or extremes to come together, even if they formed a majority by doing so, Either broadly centre-left and or centre right coalitions usually emerge. The power of a representative voting system is that everyone's vote will have counted and assembly representation equates to votes obtained. That's the whole purpose of it. No "Big Tent (ridiculous coalition) gets absolute power on 35% of votes cast. I take your point that it doesn't always produce stability, but that's politics and liberal democracies with representative voting systems (just about every one has bar the UK) have tended to fare better than us in terms of most standard of living measures. Not many are clamouring for our system. The Merkel led CSU and SPD coalitions always fascinated me. A combination of the German versions of our two main parties, Tory and Labour. I suppose some might argue that's what centrism really is, for good or for bad. But it reflected pretty well how most Germans had voted. We rarely get a government like that in this country. Elective dictatorships based on a clear minority of votes is what we tend to produce. They make for poor governments too.
|
|
pjw1961
Member
Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
Posts: 8,417
|
Post by pjw1961 on Jan 15, 2024 21:16:42 GMT
That underlies my oft expressed scepticism about the (other) MRPs that show Labour winning in lots of rural areas. Labour has few members in those areas , even fewer councillors, no tradition of voting Labour to draw on, little organisation and they don't feature in Labour target lists. I notice that even today's MRP has Labour winning Isle of Wight - whose council of 39 members includes a grand total of 1 Labour Councillor. There are some areas where party politics rarely features in Local Government. I grew up in Pembrokeshire - a Labour-held seat 1950 - 1970 but which had very few Labour councillors at any tier of local authority. True, but rural Wales has a very different electoral history to rural Devon or Suffolk for example. The Liberals held the Isle of Wight Feb 1974 to 1987 and again 1997 to 2001, but Labour has never got close. All of the MRPs recently have had Labour wnning both seats. I will be majorly surprised if that actually happens.
|
|
|
Post by jib on Jan 15, 2024 21:21:26 GMT
Tricked! Why did the LDs allow themselves to be tricked for five years? The party could have walked out of the Coalition - many excuses were available had they been sought. What did surprise me during the Coalition years was how docile the LD MPs were. Labour at least has the Tribune and Campaign groups and the Tories have ERG and various assortments of Right wing loonies seeking to put pressure on the Leadership. There was barely a peep from the LDs during that period. Indeed they were. And came out of it without what really should have been the minimum concession - proportional voting of some form. Now stuck with FPTP in Westminster for many years. Labour lead widens to sixteen points in the latest results from Deltapoll. Con 28% (-) Lab 44% (+2) Lib Dem 10% (-2) Other 18% (-1) Fieldwork: 12th - 15th January 2024 Sample: 2,136 GB adults (Changes from 22nd-29th December 2023) Gap between Sunak and Starmer widens further That 17% drop in support for Lib Dems will cause flutters. Could just be MoE though!!
|
|
|
Post by isa on Jan 15, 2024 21:43:07 GMT
Considering what happened in last month's First Reading, perhaps that should be 'muted'. Ha ha, Just saw One Life, the film about N. Winton saving Czech kids. Traditional structure but had v good grim & funny moments, and good pace in a good weepie. Hopkins as ever is completely convicing. May hv said this before but one of the kids rescued was Karel Reisz, the director of two great but contrasting Brit new wave movies, Saturday Night & S Morning & Morgan, A Suitable Case for Treatment: the latter a favourite of mine tho not everyone's. Reisz course not notmentioned in film but brought home to me the many personal paths eradicated by people who murder chikdren. . I'd like to see the Winton film. It'll probably be on at a local arts centre soon where they do an 11 am 'breakfast' screening for £11 including coffee and a cake. Rude not to at those prices! Saw 'Saturday Night and Sunday Morning' on Talking Pictures a couple of years ago. Surprisingly frank, even for 'new wave' British cinema in 1960. Not seen 'A Suitable Case for Treatment'. After being fleeced once again by my dentist earlier, who has an unerring knack for upgrading every visit to Band B (c£70) from Band A (c£26), I took myself off to HMV for a consolatory mooch. I was gobsmacked to find 'Gold Diggers of 1933' on a newly released Blu-ray. It's one of the legendary Busby Berkeley musicals, and apart from being 91 years old, looks brand new, pin sharp and is quite brilliant. Astonishing quality. Cast includes Dick Powell, Ruby Keeler and Ginger Rogers, who, by the way, is my answer to the question "Who is the most famous person you've ever met?".
|
|
|
Post by alec on Jan 15, 2024 21:57:26 GMT
Polls looking good for Labour. No sign of any recovery, even with the inflation rate falling rapidly.
|
|
|
Post by isa on Jan 15, 2024 22:16:44 GMT
|
|
|
Post by moby on Jan 15, 2024 23:00:19 GMT
Are you thinking of Wales & NI? The last MP, who was an SoS for Scotland, that didn't represent a constituency in Scotland was Arthur Balfour 1886-7. Tsk. Should have checked. Must be Wales. They've had some narrow squeaks with that role though and after the 1997 election they'll have had a Shadow SoS for Scotland who didn't represent a Scottish constituency (although my hazy memory suggests he might have been Scottish by birth) - that's probably what I was thinking of. Steve Reed can't even claim a rural upbringing or relevant occupational experience. The Minister for Rural Affairs in Wales is Lesley Griffiths. She originates from my home town, Wrecsam. The Tory shadow minister for Rural Affairs is Samuel Kurtz based in Carmarthenshire, where I live presently. From my experience a rural upbringing does not necessarily correspond with an understanding of what's best for the environment.
|
|
|
Post by Rafwan on Jan 15, 2024 23:48:26 GMT
Considering what happened in last month's First Reading, perhaps that should be 'muted'. Ha ha, Just saw One Life, the film about N. Winton saving Czech kids. Traditional structure but had v good grim & funny moments, and good pace in a good weepie. Hopkins as ever is completely convicing. May hv said this before but one of the kids rescued was Karel Reisz, the director of two great but contrasting Brit new wave movies, Saturday Night & S Morning & Morgan, A Suitable Case for Treatment: the latter a favourite of mine tho not everyone's. Reisz course not notmentioned in film but brought home to me the many personal paths eradicated by people who murder chikdren. . Tears rolled down my cheeks when the adult children stood for him in the TV show. Brilliant actor; brilliant film.
|
|
|
Post by moby on Jan 15, 2024 23:49:29 GMT
This article is worth a read because among other things, such as highlighting division, it also shows the sheer bandwidth this Govmt is spending on the Rwanda bill, a bill which is totemic for the Tories but has actually very little relevance to the day to day lives of people living in this country. Where do the issues that matter to most of us, such as the cost of living crisis, the NHS, Social Care, etc come in the list of their priorities?🤬 www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/15/sunak-faces-tory-meltdown-as-deputy-chairs-back-rwanda-bill-rebellion
|
|
|
Post by mercian on Jan 15, 2024 23:53:04 GMT
I don't suppose many on here will be interested but this is Reform UK's offering for the GE:
". no one earning less than £20,000 pays income tax . spare capacity in the private sector is used to slash NHS waiting lists . potential migrants are returned immediately to the French coast . we operate a "one out, one in" legal migration policy . we keep our energy prices down by producing our own oil and gas . all the arbitrary and clearly ridiculous Net Zero targets are scrapped
- and you definitely won't be forced to replace your perfectly good gas boiler with a £15,000 heat pump, or your perfectly maintained petrol and diesel car with a new £30,000 electric one. "
I can see how these policies would have wide appeal if they can be publicised enough.
|
|
|
Post by Rafwan on Jan 16, 2024 0:00:08 GMT
“… I think he made the Labour party a safe haven for antisemitism …” stevei am quite certain that you know this to be a false claim and I respectfully ask that you cease making it. i have put this to you previously, providing both hard evidence as well as clear opinion of eminent (Jewish) members of the judiciary, academics and Labour supporters and members as well as prominent figures from the entertainment world.
|
|
|
Post by lens on Jan 16, 2024 0:18:51 GMT
The controversy now is over the **EXPANSION** of ULEZ to cover a vastly wider area, which the Conservatives most certainly do not favour! It was reported here on UKPR that Khan was required by central government to support expansion of the charging zone as a condition of increasing the grant to London transport, when it was going bust because of covid lockdowns and resulting drop in passengers. So firstly, it was conservative policy coming from government, but secondly he gave in to their blackmail. Danny - do you have a reference for that claim of "Khan was required by central government to support expansion of the charging zone". Because whatever faults they may have, the current government have NEVER been in favour of expansion of the ULEZ zone! But let me know if you have a definitive reference to the contrary? I suspect it's a case of the facts getting garbled. What is true is that Tfl's finances were in a mess after Covid, and the passenger drop due to lockdown and such as WFH, and Khan went to central government for extra money. He was given some (several billions) - but not as much as he demanded. As one reference (from over a year ago) www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/feb/21/tfl-bailout-talks-grant-shapps-sadiq-khan-london-transport Far from Khan "giving in to government blackmail", the suggestion is the other way round. It was Khan as the blackmailer - effectively saying "if you don't give me what I want I'll make up the shortfall via some form of road charging". And deciding that bringing in such via a ULEZ expansion would mostly hit residents in mainly Tory held boroughs. Unfortunately, his thinking didn't go as far as to realise that the effects on the poorest in such areas would be disproportionately the hardest. And Danny - I really don't have the energy to respond to your very long recent post in detail, but just to pick out a couple of the sillier points. In answer to "how many cars - petrol, diesel, whatever - only do 20,000 miles over their lifetime?", you responded "I dont know. Do you?" The answer is "extremely few", which a simple bit of googling would have easily told you. Do you know how to use google? As a reference, try www.webuyanycar.com/guides/car-ownership/how-many-miles-can-a-car-last/ They open with "In general, you can expect a conventional car to last for around 200,000 miles." (Though personally I'd say 100,000 to about 120,000 miles is likely to be more typical.) Of course, you may pull out of a garage with a brand new car in front of a bus and write your car off with only delivery mileage, but hardly statistically relevant? For another, you say: "Dont forget, electric vehicles are actually heavier than petrol ones, so inherently less efficient on that score." No, Danny. No. Just rubbish. You're forgetting a key point about a BEV - that in slowing down a large proportion of the kinetic energy gets put back in the battery via regenerative braking. And more weight means more kinetic energy, and more opportunity for regen! And before I lose the will to live, on the subject of any BEV second hand market, you say: "Its assumed this would happen, but it hasnt. There is no quantity supply of cheap second hand electric vehicles." Errr, well no, Danny. That was precisely my point. The second hand market may be relatively small **at the moment**, but the market in new such cars is relatively recent, the great majority of UK BEVs are around less than 3 years old. Tesla's model 3 only STARTED to be produced in 2017, and it was a year or two before becoming widely available in the UK. BEVs from other manufacturers tend to be even more recent. You say "it hasn't" - you really should be saying "it hasn't yet". If you're looking for a 10 year old Tesla 3, you may well have to wait until 2030 or so - not surprising as few new ones were around before 2020!
|
|
|
Post by mercian on Jan 16, 2024 0:29:33 GMT
I would think too that demographically, politically and socioeconomically, rural dwellers wouldn't be a very representative slice of the UK population. Put another way, whilst not being exactly homogenous, they may have always been, and probably always will be, people with cultural and voting habits engrained for generations. They are perhaps not representative but except in very remote areas a lot of country dwellers nowadays are refugees from the increasingly lawless cities. This trend will increase with the movement towards working from home. I wonder what proportion of the population of Droitwich and Evesham for instance have lived there for generations?
|
|
|
Post by mercian on Jan 16, 2024 0:44:13 GMT
Ben Walker in New Statesman on why Reform isn't gifting the election to Labour1. Most Reform voters will not vote for the Tories even if Reform does not stand a candidate (More in Common puts the Tory switchers at 25% and YouGov at 31%) 2. 12% of those who pay a high attention to politics say they will vote for Reform, but it is only 6% for those with mid level of attention and 3% for those with a low level of attention; for Labour the corresponding figures are 42, 44, and 53% respectively and for the Tories 25, 27 and 19% respectively. The polling may well be overestimating Reform support and underestimating Labour support. If you have many supporters who will turn out and vote for a donkey as long as it has a red rosette, they will do that regardless of what the polls say. For the Conservatives – the government of the day – to believe that they can deny Labour a majority by relying solely on anti-system Reform voters is not an improbable hope: it’s an impossible one.You're right but it's not something to be proud of that the less attention people pay to politics the more likely they to vote for your party. I think that there will be a much lower turnout in this GE than the last two (which were unusually high) and possibly the lowest ever. I base this on the local by-election results where Labour's share of the vote often falls despite the massive poll lead. Although there is a widespread feeling of being fed up with the Tories there is not much so far to enthuse potential Labour supporters. A low turnout is generally thought to favour the Tories and your figures show why - people less interested in politics are less likely to turn out.
|
|
|
Post by isa on Jan 16, 2024 0:44:26 GMT
This article is worth a read because among other things, such as highlighting division, it also shows the sheer bandwidth this Govmt is spending on the Rwanda bill, a bill which is totemic for the Tories but has actually very little relevance to the day to day lives of people living in this country. Where do the issues that matter to most of us, such as the cost of living crisis, the NHS, Social Care, etc come in the list of their priorities?🤬 www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/15/sunak-faces-tory-meltdown-as-deputy-chairs-back-rwanda-bill-rebellionWell quite, moby. And perhaps UKPR2 does actually have some wider resonance after all, as I note that No. 10 is describing the 'rebels' as a "paper tiger", exactly as they were described on here yesterday.
|
|
|
Post by expatr on Jan 16, 2024 0:48:25 GMT
I don't suppose many on here will be interested but this is Reform UK's offering for the GE: . no one earning less than £20,000 pays income tax . spare capacity in the private sector is used to slash NHS waiting lists . potential migrants are returned immediately to the French coast . we operate a "one out, one in" legal migration policy . we keep our energy prices down by producing our own oil and gas . all the arbitrary and clearly ridiculous Net Zero targets are scrapped - and you definitely won't be forced to replace your perfectly good gas boiler with a £15,000 heat pump, or your perfectly maintained petrol and diesel car with a new £30,000 electric one. I can see how these policies would have wide appeal if they can be publicised enough. . no one earning less than £20,000 pays income tax OK fine but where is the shortfall made up from - this will either mean a slashing of public services or massive increases in other taxes (and I somehow suspect that means increased VAT)
. spare capacity in the private sector is used to slash NHS waiting lists There isn't any spare capacity - indeed private operations are almost entirely by moonlighting NHS docs - when labour tried they had to bring in temporary private facilities staffed by overseas docs
. potential migrants are returned immediately to the French coast Most migrants don't come via the channel - presumably this means illegal boat crossings - if so this is no different from current government (and indeed Labour's) policy - the issue is execution (which becomes harder if you spend your life insulting and refusing to work with the French)
. we operate a "one out, one in" legal migration policy This could work (provided we exported pensioners to eastern europe and replaced them with cheap eastern european care workers)
. we keep our energy prices down by producing our own oil and gas Which would be sold on the international market and therefore have marginal effect (at best) on UK energy costs
. all the arbitrary and clearly ridiculous Net Zero targets are scrapped Pure rhetoric
So when people have thought about them for about 3 seconds they would conclude "usual bollox from Nigel" and move on.
|
|