pjw1961
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Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
Posts: 8,318
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Post by pjw1961 on Apr 22, 2024 8:28:24 GMT
@davern We had our district council elections last year and the county council ones are in 2025, so all we have in May is the Essex Police, Crime and Fire Commissioner. Given the scale of this and the historically low turnout there is no point in canvassing, so we are just doing leaflet drops (actually a nice glossy mini-magazine). Although the PCFC candidate gets a page, most of the content is about introducing our new General Election candidate(s) and getting the message out that only Labour can defeat the Tories in both Braintree and Witham.
So no real feedback from the public. The few random encounters I have had suggest no current hostility to Labour (not always the case in the past) but general apathy (although that is normal for PCFC elections).
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Post by crossbat11 on Apr 22, 2024 8:51:31 GMT
davemAs is my wont, I will bring tales from the campaign trail in due course, albeit I'm making a late entrance to the fray this year. A one week Neapolitan hiatus the reason. I intend to start in earnest later this week and early next in my old hometown of Redditch where, beginning with some by election gains, and considerable success in last May's round of elections, Labour have a very decent chance of regaining overall control of the Council after a long period of Tory rule. It's also a Tamworth type parliamentary constituency and May 2nd could provide interesting indications of Labour's prospects of capturing the Redditch seat in a general election in Autumn. Door knocking and leafleting will be the main activity and I hope to talk to as many voters as I can in so doing. Confidence amongst the Labour team in Redditch is high, I'm hearing, and early canvassing returns encouraging. The national mood is helping but the local Tory Council has taken some unpopular decisions of late, particularly relating to town centre development plans. The Tories may be caught in a pincer movement of both national and local issues. An electorally fatal cocktail usually. We'll soon see. As for where I now live, I regret to have to report that the Labour revival in Sedgeberrow and Ashton-under-Hill has yet to manifest itself. P.S. Boundary Commission reviews have altered all the wards in Redditch which might make some of the contests unpredictable, certainly based on previous results.
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Post by shevii on Apr 22, 2024 9:41:34 GMT
There are times when I despair of anyone fixing the Met as anti-semitism rears its ugly head again. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/met-police-antisemitism-apology-jewish-b2531719.htmlThe antisemitism campaigner involved in the incident was Gideon Falter, chief executive of the Campaign Against Antisemitism, who was wearing a kippah skullcap when he was stopped from crossing the road near the demonstration in the Aldwych area of London on the afternoon of Saturday 13 April. A video clip posted by the organisation showed one police officer saying to him: “You are quite openly Jewish, this is a pro-Palestinian march. I’m not accusing you of anything but I’m worried about the reaction to your presence.” Metropolitan Police assistant commissioner Matt Twist had said earlier on Friday: “The fact that those who do this often film themselves while doing so suggests they must know that their presence is provocative, that they’re inviting a response and that they’re increasing the likelihood of an altercation.”Do the Met Police really think that being "openly Jewish" is provocative. It all reminds me of the Battle of Cable Street in 1936 when the Met Police were there to support Moseley's fascists in their desire to march through the, then, heavily Jewish East End. OK so the police officer made a badly worded comment but he knew what was going on here where it seems likely Gideon Falter was deliberately seeking a confrontation to discredit the march rather than going about his business. From Sky News: "In the Sky News footage, the activist insisted he was only trying to cross the road down which the demonstration was passing, but this is disputed by an officer in the new footage, who said Mr Falter had deliberately walked head-on into the crowd and accused him of being "disingenuous" and seeking to "antagonise" the marchers." You could argue of course that there is a right to hold a counter demonstration or the right to be anywhere dressed how you like but when policing a major event, police always have judgment calls to make and if someone appears to be deliberately trying to stir up trouble then you move them on before anything escalates. Wiki suggests the kipper skullcap is either worn all the time by Orthodox Jews or just worn at prayers and there are plenty of photos of him on Google without one so it seems that again he deliberately chose to wear one on this occasion. Campaign against antisemitism is not quite the squeaky clean organisation that you might assume from the name and have been accused of blatant Islamophobia including this tasteless attack on Sadiq Khan: And here is a critique of the organisation:
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Post by bedknobsandboomstick on Apr 22, 2024 9:42:59 GMT
Sunak is currently saying MPs and Lords will be forced to vote until the Rwanda Bill passes tonight (no information on whether £5k from party funds secures your early release).
The interesting thing is that Lord Anderson dropped some heavy hints on twitter yesterday that he, at least, is planning to table a double insistence amendment, whereby exactly the same amendment is returned to the Commons twice, at which point the vote switches so that either the Commons votes the bill through AS AMENDED BY THE LORDS, or it fails. The likely clause will be that an independent commission is required to certify that Rwanda is safe.
Given Sunak's comments above, this would clearly be the absolute maximum banter outcome.
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Post by isa on Apr 22, 2024 10:11:04 GMT
Sunak has taken seven or eight questions from the media, the majority from the likes of the Express, GB News etc. Talk about preaching to the choir.
Sky managed a question and the BBC were "finally", (in Sunak's words), allowed one. Not a sniff of a look-in for ITV and C4.
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Post by leftieliberal on Apr 22, 2024 10:37:16 GMT
There are times when I despair of anyone fixing the Met as anti-semitism rears its ugly head again. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/met-police-antisemitism-apology-jewish-b2531719.htmlThe antisemitism campaigner involved in the incident was Gideon Falter, chief executive of the Campaign Against Antisemitism, who was wearing a kippah skullcap when he was stopped from crossing the road near the demonstration in the Aldwych area of London on the afternoon of Saturday 13 April. A video clip posted by the organisation showed one police officer saying to him: “You are quite openly Jewish, this is a pro-Palestinian march. I’m not accusing you of anything but I’m worried about the reaction to your presence.” Metropolitan Police assistant commissioner Matt Twist had said earlier on Friday: “The fact that those who do this often film themselves while doing so suggests they must know that their presence is provocative, that they’re inviting a response and that they’re increasing the likelihood of an altercation.”Do the Met Police really think that being "openly Jewish" is provocative. It all reminds me of the Battle of Cable Street in 1936 when the Met Police were there to support Moseley's fascists in their desire to march through the, then, heavily Jewish East End. OK so the police officer made a badly worded comment but he knew what was going on here where it seems likely Gideon Falter was deliberately seeking a confrontation to discredit the march rather than going about his business. From Sky News: "In the Sky News footage, the activist insisted he was only trying to cross the road down which the demonstration was passing, but this is disputed by an officer in the new footage, who said Mr Falter had deliberately walked head-on into the crowd and accused him of being "disingenuous" and seeking to "antagonise" the marchers." You could argue of course that there is a right to hold a counter demonstration or the right to be anywhere dressed how you like but when policing a major event, police always have judgment calls to make and if someone appears to be deliberately trying to stir up trouble then you move them on before anything escalates. Wiki suggests the kipper skullcap is either worn all the time by Orthodox Jews or just worn at prayers and there are plenty of photos of him on Google without one so it seems that again he deliberately chose to wear one on this occasion. Campaign against antisemitism is not quite the squeaky clean organisation that you might assume from the name and have been accused of blatant Islamophobia including this tasteless attack on Sadiq Khan: And here is a critique of the organisation: The Muslim Association of Britain are hardly pure themselves. See the Wikipedia article on them The group is reported to have had direct ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas;
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Post by steamdrivenandy on Apr 22, 2024 10:45:17 GMT
I've just done a Yougov survey and there was a question about whether I'd approve of Liz Truss returning to front line politics. Later I came across the current result - 84% against. So a ringing endorsement for all the recent press coverage, not. Thinking on I bet a few of the 8% who approve include a number of 'let's do it for a laugh' votes, so the real disapproval is probably even higher than 84%.
Do you think she'll get the message?
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pjw1961
Member
Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
Posts: 8,318
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Post by pjw1961 on Apr 22, 2024 11:02:31 GMT
There is a huge info-dump of polling here, which the Guardian has chosen to write up as bad for Labour, although they are not denying that everything still points to a Labour win. My take on it is much more that there is a general anti-politics and anti-politicians mood around, which affects all parties. This is not confined to the UK but is visible across all the democracies (and quite possibly the dictatorships as well, but of course they won't be letting us find out). www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/apr/22/labour-tories-election-polls-analysis
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Post by James E on Apr 22, 2024 11:13:04 GMT
Survation asked which party their voters (close to 1,000 of them) would support if Reform stood aside, and this produced the following: Con 29.3% (+3.1) Lab 46.5% (+1.5) LD 10.9% (+0.5) Green 4.6% (+0.4) SNP+PC 4.1% (+0.2) Others 4.5% (+2.6) (Comparisons to Survation's standard VI question) The benefit to the Conservatives is therefore only about 20% of the redistributed Reform UK vote (of which they get 37% to Labour's 18%). Note that the 'others' pick up over 30% of those who would have supported Reform, and that is in addition to those who had given UKIP, Reclaim, Heritage or whatever as their first choice. Because of this, the combined vote for the Tories + other small RoC parties is probably still around 33%. www.bestforbritain.org/spring-2024-polling(see link at bottom of page for results with Reform standing aside) I dont understand your analysis, the comments in the paragraph dont seem to have anything to do with the tabulated results. ie table says 29% of reform would switch to con, seems clear. Text says benefit to con is 20%? Then says benefit to con is 37%? Perhaps I didn't explain this well. The percentage figures above are the totals for each party in the absence of Reform UK; and the figures in brackets reflect the difference to Survation's standard VI question in the same poll, with RefUK as an option. So the Conservatives gain 3.1 points of the 8.5% Reform vote, which is 37% of it, and Labour get 1.5 of 8.5%, etc... The overall split of that 8.5% RefUK vote per Survation (with about 1,000 respondents) is: Con 37% Lab 18% LD 6% Green 5% SNP / PC 3% Others 31% This can be compared to YouGov's findings last December, when Reform were on around 8%. When asked what they would do if Reform did not have a candidate, their respondents divided as: Con 31% Lab 3% LD 4% Green 3% SNP/PC 0% Would not vote 27% Others 20% yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/47759-conservatives-unlikely-to-win-over-reform-uk-supporters-at-next-election
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Apr 22, 2024 12:49:32 GMT
leftieliberal“ The Muslim Association of Britain are hardly pure themselves. See the Wikipedia article on them The group is reported to have had direct ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas;” Why place this brief post with another, complete with large pictures, which was about thirty times as long as yours and had just been posted? This is a really unnecessary and rather stupid habit.
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pjw1961
Member
Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
Posts: 8,318
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Post by pjw1961 on Apr 22, 2024 12:55:54 GMT
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Apr 22, 2024 13:10:00 GMT
Savanta correcting an error on their West Mids Mayoral poll. Still very close, but now Labour 3 points in front instead of 2 points behind
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steve
Member
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 13:25:18 GMT
domjgIf you went and stayed around Parque las Indias in Santa Cruz you'd get a pretty authentic Spanish experience, you'd probably be the only tourist there!
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Apr 22, 2024 13:31:17 GMT
Sky News
'Former parliamentary researcher charged with spying for China under Official Secrets Act
Christopher Cash, 29, a former parliamentary researcher, and Christopher Berry, 32, "will be charged with providing prejudicial information to a foreign state, China", the CPS counterterrorism division has said.
Cash worked in parliament for the China Research Group, and has links to senior Conservative MPs, including Alicia Kearns, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, and now security minister, Tom Tugendhat'
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steve
Member
Posts: 12,091
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 13:35:10 GMT
In not remotely surprising news.
"An initial account of an exchange between a police officer and an antisemitism campaigner that sparked heavy criticism of Scotland Yard did not show the full picture, a former senior officer has said.
Footage released by the Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) last Friday showed its chief executive, Gideon Falter, being told by a police officer that his “openly Jewish” appearance risked antagonising pro-Palestinian marchers. This precipitated claims Falter was prevented from going about his business simply because he was a Jewish man in the vicinity of a pro-Palestinian demonstration.
But a longer version of the same exchange has since emerged on Sky News, showing the officer explaining that his concern was that he had seen Falter acting in a way that led him to believe he was trying to provoke a confrontation with marchers.
That fuller account showed “a totally different encounter to the one that Mr Falter has reported”, said the former Scotland Yard chief superintendent Dal Babu on Monday.
While Babu said the “openly Jewish” comment was “not acceptable”, he told BBC Breakfast that the longer clip showed Falter “attempting to go against the march, trying to push past the officers, and I think for 13 minutes the officers showed great restraint”.
Babu added: “They offered to take him to a crossing point, they offered to help him and the group he was with the opportunity to cross at a more appropriate place. So the narrative that’s been pushed for the past few days is not accurate.
“Personally, if I was policing that march, I would have been inclined to have arrested [Falter] for assault on a police officer and breach of the peace.”( So would I btw)
No danger of an apology from the conservative friends of Israel I suppose!
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Post by pete on Apr 22, 2024 13:44:14 GMT
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Post by crossbat11 on Apr 22, 2024 14:01:06 GMT
neiljIf Street goes west in the West Midlands Mayoral election, it's an extraordinarily ominous result for the Tories in the region in terms of their prospects in the forthcoming general election. It will signify that incumbency and personal popularity isn't enough to stem the national anti-Tory tide. Nor, seemingly, the recent travails of the Labour-run Birmingham City council. Bankruptcy, slashed services and soaring council tax bills. The Labour Mayoral candidate will no doubt take hits for this debacle. The West Midlands contains a lot of Tory v Labour marginals and, rather like the Red Wall seats in the North, the area has tended to drift steadily in a Tory direction since 2010. For example, who on earth would have expected the Tories to win seats like Dudley and West Bromwich? They have though, and held them too. If Street can't bolster them in his fiefdom, then it's difficult to imagine what or who can.
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Post by crossbat11 on Apr 22, 2024 14:17:12 GMT
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steve
Member
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 15:06:25 GMT
pjw1961Just the police crime commissioner here. I was asked if I wanted to consider standing but it's too much work to be honest.
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steve
Member
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 15:07:25 GMT
crossbat11We were just five goals short of a victory in both the last two games. Consistency.
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steve
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 15:30:46 GMT
Day one of Desperate Dons criminal fraud attempt at electoral interference case underway. Wrongly titled a hush money case, the act of paying off a porn star when you'd been cheating on your wife who'd just given birth wasn't actually a crime( maybe it should have been), but pretending the payment was for legal services to avoid a follow up bad press after the " grab them by the pussy" recording, was. Unlike previous trials where the traitors legal turn were comically inept the lead attorney here Todd Blanche is actually an experienced prosecutor and trial lawyer. He'll have his work well and truly cut out to get his guilty client off. youtu.be/wrGpkxEW3t8?si=YDn_wsDExS6T052S
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steve
Member
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 15:34:16 GMT
"Tomlinson started by saying it was disappointing that MPs were debating this again. He said Labour has now voted against the government’s plans to tackle illegal migration 134 times."
let's see if they can get that up to 135.
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Apr 22, 2024 16:02:08 GMT
Redfield Wilton - one for steveLowest Conservative % since Sunak became PM. One point above their lowest under Truss. Westminster VI (21 April): Labour 43% (-1) Conservative 20% (-2) Reform 14% (-1) Liberal Democrat 12% (+3) Green 6% (–) SNP 3% (–) Other 1% (–) Changes +/- 14 April
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Post by mercian on Apr 22, 2024 16:26:49 GMT
Don't most people holidaying in the UK stay in hotels, boarding houses, holiday chalets, caravans, holiday camps, camping and so on? How does that affect the housing stock? I know Airbnb is a growing phenomenon but I doubt if it's very significant (yet) compared to these other things. You're not aware of the huge number of homes that have been converted to short term holiday lets in places like Cornwall and the West Wales coast? I once got thoroughly lost on the winding backroads between Carmarthen and Cardigan with no phone signal and no map. I was searching for a house to ask the way and every single one I came upon turned out to be an empty holiday let. Might some of them have been empty second (holiday) homes as opposed to lets? especially if they were empty.
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steve
Member
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Post by steve on Apr 22, 2024 16:29:12 GMT
neiljIf I've worked this out correctly if the lib dems performed about as well in their target seats against the Tories as they did in 2019 this sort of collapse brings around 85 seats into play around 60 likely wins a potential total mp count approaching 100. Before the usual suspect reached for his crayons I think this highly unlikely as our party simply doesn't have the resources to actively target 100 seats. If pressed I think 60-70 is more plausible. Which of course would still make us the official opposition by around 40!
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Post by graham on Apr 22, 2024 17:03:48 GMT
Delta poll Lab 43% (-2) CON: 27% (+2) RFM: 12% (+1) LDM: 9% (=) GRN: 5% (=) SNP: 3% (=)
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Post by leftieliberal on Apr 22, 2024 17:09:47 GMT
leftieliberal “ The Muslim Association of Britain are hardly pure themselves. See the Wikipedia article on them The group is reported to have had direct ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas;” Why place this brief post with another, complete with large pictures, which was about thirty times as long as yours and had just been posted? This is a really unnecessary and rather stupid habit. They're Islamists and anything they write is not to be trusted. Do I really need to spell it out to you?
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pjw1961
Member
Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.
Posts: 8,318
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Post by pjw1961 on Apr 22, 2024 17:33:59 GMT
Day one of Desperate Dons criminal fraud attempt at electoral interference case underway. Wrongly titled a hush money case, the act of paying off a porn star when you'd been cheating on your wife who'd just given birth wasn't actually a crime( maybe it should have been), but pretending the payment was for legal services to avoid a follow up bad press after the " grab them by the pussy" recording, was. Unlike previous trials where the traitors legal turn were comically inept the lead attorney here Todd Blanche is actually an experienced prosecutor and trial lawyer. He'll have his work well and truly cut out to get his guilty client off. youtu.be/wrGpkxEW3t8?si=YDn_wsDExS6T052SOne small detail that always strikes me as odd about this - and which has just been repeated on the 6 o'clock news - is the the BBC always says that Trump had "an affair" with Stormy Daniels. They also said the same tonight of a separate incident with a different lady, who he also paid hush money to. The reality is that in each case Trump originally paid money to the women concerned for a single night of sex. That is not exactly unknown behaviour, but I have never heard it described as "an affair" before. It feels like establishment protection of one of their own.
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Post by mandolinist on Apr 22, 2024 17:42:50 GMT
@davern We had our district council elections last year and the county council ones are in 2025, so all we have in May is the Essex Police, Crime and Fire Commissioner. Given the scale of this and the historically low turnout there is no point in canvassing, so we are just doing leaflet drops (actually a nice glossy mini-magazine). Although the PCFC candidate gets a page, most of the content is about introducing our new General Election candidate(s) and getting the message out that only Labour can defeat the Tories in both Braintree and Witham. So no real feedback from the public. The few random encounters I have had suggest no current hostility to Labour (not always the case in the past) but general apathy (although that is normal for PCFC elections). Here in Bristol, in the ward currently held by the leader of the Conservative group, we have received six election leaflets from them, one from Labour and none from anyone else. We have also been canvassed by the Tory candidates (two councillors will be elected). They seem very worried and are spending a lot of money and energy in the ward. In the next door ward it is the Greens who are putting in all the effort and although Labour look vulnerable there, they are nowhere to be seen. In the more up market ward just to the south of us, Liberal Democrat posters can be seen, Green posters are proliferating in other areas, but that is it. Judging by the increasingly frantic emails from the Labour Party, which I left over 12 months ago, begging for help, the grass roots have been withering for a while, they are short of bodies and money.
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Apr 22, 2024 17:45:02 GMT
Moments after Rishi Sunak said "we will not be giving away sensitive operational details" about the Rwanda scheme, reporters found a Wad of "sensitive" Rwanda documents left behind at Rishi Sunak's press conference ... under a senior minister's chair The documents said flights were scheduled for June Piss up in a brewery springs to mind
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