Labour would be well advised to take Bill Clinton’s advice. A party’s popularity has much to do with the state of the economy and with their own record at economic management. Labour’s decision inĀ these latest elections to launch a constant barrage of allegations about Conservative Ministers instead of setting out what they would like to doĀ misjudged the mood and meant their candidates were associated with negativeĀ stories and carping attitudes.
TheĀ misjudgement probably goes back to Labour’s persistent wish to impose a false view of electoral history on the country. Their belief is Tony Blair beat John Major after running a three and a half year campaign about alleged Tory sleaze. Much of it was cases of individuals sleeping inĀ the wrong beds , with Labour claiming this was relevant thanks to a misinterpretation of John Major’s Back to Basics speech in October 1993. Once Labour got in to power they decided to prevent any attempt to turn the campaign against themĀ by claiming that in future these were all private lives matters that should not be part of politics.
If you look at the opinion polls you see that Conservative fortunes plunged from September 6 1992 when the UK fell out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism and had to acknowledge its economic policies had failed and we were in a nasty recession. Until the ERM disaster the Conservatives had been around 40% and ahead of Labour. On 5 September despite obvious pressures against the policy in currency markets Conservatives still had a 4% lead with a Ā 39% Vote share. By the summer of 1993, before the sleaze campaign began Conservative polls had settled down at around 31% and Labour were well ahead. By Ā 7 May 1994 for example Labour had a 15% lead at 44% to 29%. Between 1993 and the 1997 General election little changed, and the final result was Conservative 31% and Labour 44%, a landslide win. No-one looking at these polls can come to any conclusion other than the destruction of the European Ā Economic policy and the collateral damage it did lost the Conservatives around 10% of support which they never regained. The sleaze campaign did not shift the dial.
Similarly Labour lost in 2010 not because of the expenses scandal butĀ because they presided over the Great recession. They did not stop the excess credit build up they were warned about prior to 2008, and then decided to blame and trash the banking system instead of injecting liquidity and organising a work out of the problems. That is what they have to address in their thinking. People do not think Labour have a vision to back a recovery. All they hear is Labour running the country down and carping that Brexit was a wrong call. Many voters want the wins from Brexit. Why should Brexit UK vote in a Remain party who would then wish to prove their negative view of Brexit by following policies that were damaging instead of making the Ā changes to deliver more freedom and prosperity?
May 8, 2021
Good morning.
The comment about the economy was not the only thing ‘New Labour’ borrowed from the American Democrats. They also used a glamorous campaign offering a better future with a charismatic leader and, along with a ‘new’ name broke away and distanced themselves from the past. They also dropped Clause 4 which was a major step in calming the markets. In short, Labour, or ‘New Labour’ as it was to become know, was a marketing and PR exercise / rebranding success. It also helped that, in later years, the economy was to improve and people associated that with New Labour’s policies. True, New Labour did not change much to begin with, why would they when things were going so well, but then things began to change.
Sleaze (the Bernie Ecclestone / F1 tobacco affair) in New Labour’s early years did not affect them at the polls as the economy was doing well. What caused Labour’s downfall in the 2010 GE was a combination of shrewd political maneuvering by the Conservative Party and CMD to cultivate the Liberal Democrats and Nick Clegg and, the sheer arrogance of Gordon Brown by the way he treated Clegg. Had Blair still been in office he would have turned the tables and secured a fourth term. The Tories NEVER won the 2010 GE, people simply no longer trusted them with the economy.
When campaigning you have to have a positive message. You have to give people hope. Alexander Johnson MP never told people when seeking election that he would ban cars, increase taxes, continue with HS2 and trash the economy, but he has once elected knowing that he cannot be removed from office after the vote. A fatal flaw in our system.
Labour are stuck. They are too far-Left and really need to go back to the Blair years and reinvent themselves. Trouble is, the majority are ardent anti-Blairites.
May 8, 2021
Even a new Blair cannot bring Labour back without a new (ERM scale) disaster from Boris (this especially given their position in Scotland and Wales). Very few English want a Labour dog wagged by an SNP tail. Alas Boris does indeed have a new and even worse ERM . His, or perhaps his girl friendās, net zero CO2 lunacy.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
I agree.
By 1994 Labour had a competent and intelligent Blair following on from a solid John Smith, Tories had Major. The ERM calamity just reflected the man.
In 2010 Labour had Brown-partisan, anti-English, fuming, unable to connect. Tories had Cameron, so-called heir to Blair. The economy again mattered but the personalities mattered more.
2019-The Tories had a close run-who’d have bet on a May versus Corbyn win for May, having made a complete Horlicks of everything she touched? In the end, the Tories have spent more than Corbyn dreamed of… Johnson has spent large on the economy and it should by rights be in tatters … yet he’s well ahead of a metropolitan forensic bore. Who’d have thought it?
May 8, 2021
Mark,
He also lied on TV to say again Brexit is done! In protocol still very much an issue, fisheries still an issue. What of the financial services and Jersey fiasco? All focus on Chinese virus. People are only now waking up that he sold the nation out on Brexit ie ECHR, Paris Agreement, level playing field on environment, labour laws, competition and state aid! To name a few. Then being part of many more EU controlled ventures without a say. That is not taking back control, money or laws.
Tories needed this lockdown for election purposes. There is no justification for still being locked down. None.
As for sleaze, JR is wrong. It goes to the heart of the persons character. 2009 expense scandal- when the public knew what was happening they were very unhappy despite MPs trying to cover it up and legally prevent it becoming known! Brownās Gillian Duffy remark cost him dearly. His remark was about immigration and it became obvious he was calling all those who raised concerns bigots!
May 8, 2021
Indeed; Boris has joined a too long list of traitorous PMs.
May 8, 2021
I agree. A charismatic leader who looks the part is one of the main ingredients for success.
This current Government is riding high at the moment but it wonāt last. Their main reason for success is the dire state of the opposition. As soon as people realise the personal cost of the Green policies and their inaction on immigration they will be voted out again. What surprises me is that people continue to vote for either of the two main parties.
May 8, 2021
Mark B
Johnson is the heir to Blair, wear a blue rosette?
May 8, 2021
Wearing!
May 8, 2021
its currently a one party state, as we have no real opposition.
its not a case of left and right, as most real world people support policies a la carte from different parts of the left/right spectrum. rather its the massive disconnect between the political class and real world people, and that gap is bad enough with the Conservatives, with the Labour party its off the scale.
the difference of opinion between London voters and the rest of the country is also a big problem for national unity and London’s status at the capital, its now regarded as out of control.
the entire political class talk with forked tongue on lots of issues, immigration, equality, woke agenda, balance of state versus private sector, national debt, its all a national embarrassment.
May 8, 2021
Cameron had a 17 point poll lead before he started courting the Lib Dems with his “not a cigarette paper of difference” article in the Observer just a few months before the election. His pursuit of the Lib Dems turned a landslide into a near run thing as to whether the incompetent Labour would continue to have a role in government. I think he lacked the stomach for leading on the necessary actions and preferred coalition.
May 8, 2021
Actually I agree with much of that.
Johnson’s claim to be “the workers’ party” is nonsense.
It might be, for quasi-feral self-employed tradesmen, but nurses, teachers, call centre staff, shop and office workers, technicians and engineers are all workers – and most of them know very well that the Tories in no way stand for their emancipation.
They are, mistakenly, the party for the tradesmen’s class however, and Labour need waste no time on them. It should focus on those Home Counties seats again.
May 8, 2021
“quasi feral self employed tradesmen”…wow MiC
What a huge generalised slur against millions of people.
Good job your Labour party doesn’t need their votes.
Oh hang on they do.
Stay in opposition.
It is where you all deserve to be.
May 8, 2021
Most of the people I know are well aware that no party’s policies can really make much difference to them, and that policy speeches are just the political version of marketing.
But they also know that their personal prosperity depends on how well their branch, their employer and their industry does. They know when a failing company removes jobs from an area and when new industries bring jobs to an area.
In other words, they have an intuition that when the economy as a whole does well, then on average and over time, they will do well. Is this what you call “feral”? Is it “feral” to know that it’s basic economics that counts, and Government letting expansion happen, and not pretending that the leader of the opposition has a magic wand?
May 9, 2021
Mic “Do you know the meaning of “emancipation”? In what way are nurses, teachers not emancipated?
May 9, 2021
All employed people are vulnerable to ever more onerous contracts under Tory rule.
They cannot even enforce the terms that they have against employers, because Tory statutes have legalised their tearing up by employers – subject to a nominal “process”.
May 9, 2021
Any examples of teachers and nurses having their contracts torn up MiC?
May 9, 2021
No…came the reply.
More fake news claims from MiC
May 8, 2021
I question whether your party has a real vision for recovery. Bill Clinton’s phrase, “Its the economy stupid” has as much relevance to current government thinking as to any other party. You will not be forgiven for not capitalising on the post Brexit/Covid era. Liz Truss is doing her bit to provide a better market.place, what are the rest doing. The Treasury on tax for instance. Even Biden proposes 21% Corporation Tax and the freedom to demand it from the big american soft tax incorporators. For me the jury is still out on the current government. I allow them the distraction of Covid, but now is the time for action in all the outstanding deficiencies. The NI Protocol needs to be shown for the political punishment device it is and removed. We need to rapidly move to self sufficiency of Power, having seen the effect of dependency on the EU. The Greens have been shown to be no more than a fart in a bottle, so stop pandering to their armagedon philosophy. Confine Woke and its evil, controlling practices to the idiot fringe with manacles. Get a grip on illegal immigration, the Police and the appalling levels of crime they preside over. The list of unfinished business is almost endless so I will cease boring you with yet more. However be seen to be acting on the list, before Labour realise there is much they could set their sites on and come creeping back.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
Bang on again Agricola – Boris is riding high on his vaccine success and deserves recognition for it.
It wasn’t Nicola Sturgeon or Mark Drakeford who signed those deals, it was Johnson’s government. But as we come out of the emergency, other matters will come to the fore. Getting the NI Protocol sorted, having a viable energy strategy (where we are self-sufficient and not wholly reliant on renewables) approaching climate change with measured policies that are achievable and don’t wreck our economy would all be good to see. But I’m not holding my breath, because there’s no sign of that happening currently.
So you are correct Sir John – it’s “the Economy Stupid” – but don’t expect to stay in power if inflation let’s rip and all you have to offer if the “green economy” (whatever that is). The voters of Hartlepool expect jobs and local investment – not pie-in-the sky green nonsense.
May 8, 2021
Agreed, if Johnson carries on with his green command economy ideas, with client state , it will cripple any economic recovery, but I fear he has bought into religion on the issue, where all sense of proportion is lost, and where anything can be justified in the name of it. Same with the wokery , culture war and hate crimes, here Johnson has shown no interest putting the wokery and culture war back in its box, neither is he interested in telling the police to stop wasting their time with hurty words expressed on twitter, and get on with hunting down the criminals burgling our homes etc.
May 8, 2021
+ 1. So agree agricola. Sadly Johnson will see yesterdayās results as a mandate to carry on with his big state, high tax and spend, green crap socialist policies. Nothing will change.
May 8, 2021
Agricola, +1.
Excellent list of worthwhile āthings to doā for any government with conservative values.
Maybe thatās why itāll continue to be a dreamerās list.
May 8, 2021
@agricola +1
May 8, 2021
+2
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
The Brexit referendum really opened our eyes to the lies, deceit and downright dishonesty of many politicians, and they were of all parties. A politician who does not respect democracy does not respect their people or their country. We need politicians who work for the benefit of the UK and its people.
May 8, 2021
Well said.
May 8, 2021
Well, the Tories have certainly made enormous use of the fact that the High Court ruled not long ago that it is not Misconduct In Public Office for a Minister to lie* to the public – in Johnson’s case re the Leave campaign.
If that isn’t, then what is, please?
* A reasonable person would accept that on the evidence given, Johnson did knowingly and intentionally mislead by falsehood.
May 8, 2021
MiC
I wonder how many voters had that issue in their minds when voting.
Not many it would seem.
This is as relevant to voters as Labour’s useless attempt to bang on about wall paper.
May 8, 2021
Oh, not many Tory voters, no.
They may well have simply believed the lies however.
May 8, 2021
It seems a lot of people trusted Jeremy even less Martin – did you vote for him? š
May 8, 2021
Shirley M – absolutely spot on. All they want is our vote – based on a pile of s0-called promises – which are discarded as soon as the polling station doors close.
May 8, 2021
The irony of your post is that it is the Brexitists who do not respect democracy. You did not respect democracy during the 40 years we were in the EU and its predecessors – with the electorate giving its overwhelming approval for such arrangements in nine consecutive general elections. You still continued to complain and to campaign to undermine democracy.
I for one have never had any problem at all with Brexit on the terms promised by the Brexitists ahead of the referendum. They promised all of the benefits of EU membership, and more, with none of the responsibilities or costs. Whatās not to like?
The problem is that their promises were always undeliverable – and what was deliverable would never have received a majority had it been on the ballot paper. Your withdrawal agreement was so bad you refused to put it to public in a confirmatory referendum. So you used an election where the majority voted against it. Nobody has ever had a say on your trade deal.
The majority of electorate will never vote for a border down the Irish Sea, or for masses of pointless new paperwork, or for visa waivers for holidays, or for expats to be forced home, or for gunboats in the Channel, or for an end to friendly scientific cooperation or an end to student exchanges. Yet this is what you have delivered.
If you were not all so gutless you would have asked the electorate to give its verdict on your actual Brexit rather than the fraudulent fantasy peddled in 2016. You didnāt because you would have lost.
May 8, 2021
Andy, you’re falling behind again. Brexit has not caused ‘an end to student exchanges’ as you wrongly claim. In December 2020 the government announced the Turing scheme. Over Ā£100 million will be made available to allow around 35,000 students to go on placements and exchanges overseas, as from September 2021. From the govt web site :
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-turing-scheme-to-support-thousands-of-students-to-study-and-work-abroad
‘The new scheme will also target students from disadvantaged backgrounds and areas which did not previously have many students benefiting from Erasmus+, making life-changing opportunities accessible to everyone across the country.’
December was five months ago – you really should keep up.
May 8, 2021
The notion that the electorate gave support for the EU project is obviously false. The one characteristic that all parties that supported the EU had on common – which meant all three main parties – is that they consistently hid what EU membership meant, signed agreements behind closed doors – after midnight in one case – and successfully headed off any open debate about the matter. And on the rare occasions that they were challenged, fell back on the traditional “too later to complain now” EU response.
As for what people were voting for, you simply *cannot* have a referendum on detail because you don’t negotiate the detail unless you vote to leave, If you want an example, what were Scots voting for or against in 2015? What detail did they get?
May 8, 2021
Sadly with the exception of our host and a handful of others, such politicians are as rare as hensā teeth.
May 8, 2021
So true, Shirley M
May 8, 2021
Indeed, John Major taking us into the idiotic ERM as Chancellor did immense damage and then crashing out as PM buried the party for three + terms.
His failure to even apologise or change his EU policy made this far worse. But then why did Mrs Thatcher appoint someone so limited in avility and with three O levels (not including Maths) to be Chancellor? Why to did moronic āgroup thinkā in parliament and civil service nearly all think that joining the ERM was a great plan when it was very obviously not? Rather like the net zero co2 āgroup thinkā insanity we have now.
You say:- A partyās popularity has much to do with the state of the economy and with their own record at economic management.
Please can you get this message to Boris and Sunak. They clearly have a duff, socialist, green crap, big gov. tax borrow and piss down the drain compass. Boris has even appointed the unpleasant Neil OāBrien as ālevelling upā adviser, levelling up what? Election is probably just three years from now.
May 8, 2021
Lifelogic
Last paragraph – +1
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
I have actually manage to find something sensible that Lord Adonis said (it is not easy):-
āPPE is a degree essentially in rhetoric, not in intellectual substance,ā says Adonis. āPPE produces generations of students who are very good at making arguments on the basis of very flimsy substance. It does teach you a lot about writing very glib 2000-word essays, which have an argument you could just as easily write the reverse of the next week.
He read PPE but sensibly switched to History.
May 8, 2021
Didn’t Boris read History? I’d rather he’d read Economics.
May 8, 2021
No, he read “Greats”, i.e. Classics- Greek and Latin literature and history and the philosophy of Greek and Roman thinkers.
May 8, 2021
I stand corrected and as shame-faced as one of the Gestes.
May 8, 2021
And if you read much Classical literature and history, it’s an extremely relevant background. The Greeks, Romans, Egyptians and Persians faced all the issues we face today, and then some.
May 8, 2021
He’s PPE at heart. Still trying to argue we should rejoin the EU.
May 8, 2021
Well he and Sunak do not seem to understand very much logic, maths, science, engineering, accounting, risk/reward, growing the wealth creating sector or basic maths. Nor much about fair competition or freedom of choice.
May 8, 2021
PPE — Media Studies for poshoes. Of limited value in the market place.
JF
May 8, 2021
Excellent, LL, and thatās why weāll continue to try to run in treacle, sail in the Sargasso Sea, fly in a fog, and never awake from a nightmare.
May 8, 2021
Blair won three elections thanks mainly to the entirely predictable disaster of Majorās ERM. It is hard to see Labour coming back especially, given the SNP strenght, unless Boris makes a similar huge error.
Alas he is doing this with his unscientific Net Zero CO2 plant food insanity and his tax borrow and piss down the drain economic polices.
May 8, 2021
What is a government bond life logic ?
You simply have no idea . Otherwise you wouldn’t post such nonsense?
EVERY analysis you do is based on fixed FX and the gold standard. You must surely realise that does not apply to the UK?
May 8, 2021
Can the Conservatives avoid the blame this time for trashing the economy?
May 8, 2021
What choice will the voters have anyway, when the opposition want to trash the economy even more?
May 8, 2021
Not if one of the main reasons (on top of the current, far more harm and good, extended lockdown) is Boris’s idiotic war on CO2 which might easily cost several Ā£trillions and with no benefit whatsoever.
Also Sunak’s huge tax increases and anti-business agenda that will destroy jobs & raise less tax overall – not more in the long term.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
No, I don’t think they can. But what is more worrying is the overwhelming impression, is that their idiotic policy direction is deliberately designed to do just that. And for me, the big question is WHY?
May 8, 2021
Why? Because it’s not ‘their’ policy, J Bush. They’re just salaried politicians, paid to enforce on Britain the policy line decided on at a higher level, and for lots of other countries.
As long as you keep trying to see Johnson’s gang as ‘Conservatives’, it will never make sense. To the global movers and shakers, traditional Conservatism is just English folklore.
May 9, 2021
@Bill.B
I do so agree, but what is does demonstrate is that that most contemporary politicians are gutless self serving traitorous and lying deviants.
May 8, 2021
They might be well advised to ‘blame’ Johnson, and find a more balanced proposed PM in time to get favour back prior to the next GE. The alternative might be a real thrashing at the polls.
May 8, 2021
So the The Metric Martyrs may now finally be pardoned for the heinous crime of selling 1lb of tomatoes to a willing market customer.
Though the government is still pushing metric. Automated cars limited to 37MPH for example ie. 60 Km per hour.
May 8, 2021
That wasnāt their crime. Their crime was to not also use metric measurements as required by U.K. law. You have always been able to sell in pounds – you just have to sell in kg too.
I was born in the early 1970s. I was never taught imperial measurements at school. Nobody has been since. Think of it. Nobody under 50 has even been taught the weird, archaic and frankly pointless system you baby boomers are devoted to.
May 8, 2021
The Imperial system emerged precisely because it was highly practical in everyday life. So much so that you will find shoppers using near equivalents in markets on the Continent. Un livre, ein Pfund (Viertel, Achtel).
A side benefit was it encouraged numeracy, a skill now much in decline.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
I don’t actually think that it was a crime at all, but a civil wrong.
If he refused to comply with a Court order or similar, well that’s a different matter.
May 8, 2021
Yes they were crimes one was even given a six-month conditional discharge.
May 8, 2021
You are correct.
It’s interesting, that under the same 1985 Weights And Measures Act a prosecution was attempted against a bar operator for selling beer in litres rather than pints – but it failed, eventually.
May 8, 2021
we all grew up well aware of what a foot was, and a yard. Todays young haven’t got a clue how long a metre is.
May 8, 2021
Andy – you want to hear a weird definition?
The metre is currently defined as the length of the path travelled by light in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. … The metre was originally defined in 1793 as one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole along a great circle, so the Earth’s circumference is approximately 40000 km.
Got that ? – really useful for all sorts of everyday lengths required.,
May 8, 2021
Johnson will come a cropper too over the economy. His failure will rest on a foolish belief that his green agenda will stimulate the economy (it will make it less efficient) and an excessive addiction to government spending funded by yet higher taxes and government debt (it will cramp private sector investment). The Conservative party will need to decide how long to stick with his election winning capabilities before he runs the economy into the ground with his misguided policies and condemns it to future electoral failure.
May 8, 2021
Agree, yes all of the above, and also rising taxation by stealth/fiscal drag, Inheritance tax now not for the so called very rich, but for average people in average homes in London and the south east, which comes in immediately at 40% as well. Then like many governments it seems like a constant war against the self employed.
Mrs May threw it away and did not win by enough because of her stupid Social care policies at the time which meant you got zero help (even at home) unless your estates was worth less than Ā£23,000 which included your house !
Remember the Ā£1,000,000 IHT threshold promised by Osbourne 12 years ago, which overnight panicked a certain Mr Brown at the time, and which eventually started the Conservative fight back.
Sorry JR, in 1997 Major lost my vote because he lost control of his Party, with too many of your colleagues being far too arrogant to vote for at the time. I actually voted Looney rather than put your lot back in power at the time, as that is what we were getting.
Not a general election, but Starmer is losing ground because he was Labours Architect against Brexit (still his belief), also wants to increase taxation, borrowing, and spending, even when no pandemic.
He is not true Labour and never will be, he does not understand the thinking and mindset of the average worker, he is another Champagne Socialist of theory, and it shows.
May 8, 2021
Morning old timer,
Hope you are well.
Simply not true you are using fixed FX and a gold standard analysis that does not apply to the UK. We are sovereign use floating rates and what brexit was about.
You are also using the ” loadable funds” theory which is another myth.
May 8, 2021
+1
I didn’t vote yesterday.
I believe people are switching to Tory because they are fed up with political correctness and mass immigration, blame Labour and fail to see that the Tories are up to their necks in both .
May 8, 2021
I spoiled my ballot for the council election and gave the Conservative candidate a ‘2nd choice’ in the PCC election, with the ‘Independent’ getting my first choice. The Conservatives’ inaction on immigration was high up on my reasons not to lend them my vote. Other reasons: the destruction of the Green Belt; their cowardice in the face of the wokes; and the ongoing destruction of my community at the hands of BTL landlords. I now seem to be a political refugee.
Looking at the results yesterday, I can find some joy in the destruction of Labour but also sadness that the PM will now have no motivation to improve as a person and to abandon his supplication to the eco-loons.
The announcement by Shapps that the Green List will be so small as to be almost meaningless only confirmed my belief that I had done the right thing in the morning at the polling station.
May 8, 2021
P.S. The Independent won, by a healthy majority, and that’s significant in that Portsmouth remains ‘NOC’.
May 8, 2021
Agreed, but that is not all.
By interfering in Brexit, instead of leaving it to the professional negotiators, has resulted in not achieving full independence and sovereignty from the EU, which is what the majority voted for.
His failure to continue legal and stop illegal immigration.
His long drawn out draconian rules on the covid virus (and waste of Ā£billions) as a direct result of only listening to Hancock and SAGE computer modellers and failing to listen to medical professionals who have no vested interest, beyond upholding the Hippocratic oath. The Great Barrington Declaration springs to mind, which was dismissed out of hand by Hancock, who obviously believes his PPE degree is superior to medical qualifications!
May 8, 2021
Re: covid, forgot to add his use of the ‘nudge team’s fear-mongering and spending Ā£millions on MSM adverts to spread the fear. This alone is utterly cruel, depraved and unforgivable behaviour.
May 8, 2021
Victor Hanson, Stanford professor, writer and highly respected intellectual recently asked the question “are Americans becoming Sovietized?” and gave ten examples of what he meant. Many also apply to the UK.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
The future of the UK depends on someone in government having the mathematical skills to look at the decarbonisation plans, the details of wind energy production over the last three weeks and the common sense to fit the two together. No wind, no power. To keep industry working we used oil, even coal, and lots of continental electricity down the interconnectors. If Mr Johnson wants to go down in history as the man who introduced energy rationing to the UK he needs to find some new advisors.
JF
May 8, 2021
Oops. ‘unless’.
JF
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
Government debt?What “debt” ?-it’s outright money printing-it never gets repaid,nor is there any intention that it should-they can’t admit it because if they did they wouldn’t be able to stuff your pension funds with it!
The Western Roman Empire in it’s dying years invented a form of plating silver onto base metal which they used to mint/officially counterfeit coins.Unfortunately,in circulation, the silver coating soon wore off-just like the effects of quantitative easing.Combined with a decay in the tax base,the result was total monetary collapse.
There’s nothing new under the sun!
May 8, 2021
They are using MASS IMMIGRATION, as inadvertently admitted by our kind host, to keep it in check and by outright lying. For example. The London Mayor precept which goes on your Council Tax Bill is a whopping %9.5. That is NOT added to the official inflation figures.
May 8, 2021
OT
Heās already using the Hartlepool by-election result to justify his destructive policies, the voters seem to be playing their part in the master plan!
May 8, 2021
The Hartlepool result and some others – especially the Conservative Teeside mayor who got something Like 75% – are excellent, and show the Conservatives can win anywhere. But I hope it wonāt lead to complacency. At the next election Brexit will be judged – has it been a good thing or not? We must expect continued hostility and attrition from the EU, to which we should not over-react. Eventually they will calm down.
But what must happen is policies to make the U.K. super-competitive at least versus the eurozone. That will be the relevant comparison, when Starmer (or his successor) proposes rejoining the EEA along with various socialistic and wokist measures.
May 8, 2021
What’s excellent about the Tory party being so leftist that Hartlepool will vote for it ?
May 8, 2021
The country has never looked more Orwellian and communist than under 11 years of so called Tory rule.
May 8, 2021
+10 CINO
May 8, 2021
The country has never looked more Orwellian and communist. ( the last bit was not needed.)
May 8, 2021
The Council on Foreign Relations which apparently has the ear of President Biden thinks that the G7 and P5 are no longer fit for purpose and suggests a new Concert of Six – USA,China,India,Russia,Japan and the EU.
Oh dear!
May 8, 2021
I fear that the conservative successes in the polls will delude as fully as did Blairās easy successes in the years after ā97.
Are the Blair years remembered for being Halcyon days now? Brownās desperate days possibly only showed up the drear and dross of the preceding years.
Will Johnson bluster and blunder to successes in the polls until the realisation of his unfitness to govern becomes obvious, with a subsequent landslide rejection? I do expect that.
May 8, 2021
IMO it is time to add an extra box to the ballot paper ‘none of the above’.
I am also of the opinion no party with 50% or less votes from the electorate should assume government of the country.
Of course, there is absolutely no way the greedy self serving prospective politicians would agree to real democracy.
May 8, 2021
Hear hear.
May 8, 2021
The lesson I draw is that the tribal vote is now gone. Voting for a party because you always have done, and so did your parents and friends is a vanishing factor. That means there is plenty of scope for alternatives who capture key issues and with that, public imagination. We have already seen it over Brexit. As Net Zero bites, there will be a wide open canvas for a (new) party to provide intelligent opposition.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
I think this may very well be the pinnacle of support for your party.
With the NI situation unresolved and the betrayal of our fishing community things will deteriorate.
When we are priced off the road and sat freezing in our homes, you will be blamed.
The Jersey farago has highlighted the lack of an energy policy and the stupidity of closing down perfectly good coal fired power stations and relying on imports from a hostile state.
Enjoy while you can.
May 8, 2021
Its the economy stupid indeed it is but they also need to sort out the dire healthcare ration system. 5 million awaiting operations or procedures and many million even having trouble just getting to see their (or even a) GP.
May 8, 2021
I disagree that “Itās the economy stupid”, Labour’s problems are more proctorial, domestic, they are loosing their traditional voters (once again), in such a situation it matters not one jot how many extra votes they gain from other parties.
As for sleaze, all political parties exist within glasshouses and thus should not start throwing stones…
May 8, 2021
Sir John
At the moment all the main parties are in the vanguard of the lemming like charge to the cliff edge of self destruction bought about by all the hype and fear over climate change and CO2 levels. Nearly every major international country has been taken in it seems. Except the canny Chinese they are playing the long game with a hard ball, the way they seem to be heading will become industrially invincible.
Labour as a party at present is all but finished and the movement will implode unless it adopts a new battleground in which to rebuild its policies and its foundations. Their old ways and ideals will be banished to the history books.
Everyone interested in history can remember the years when Churchill was a lone voice against the dangers of the rise of the Hitler. But who was proved right and lead the country to victory?
The Labour Party have if they could call time out and think about the present situation we and a lot of countries are finding themselves in, could with effort a lot of hard work and belief re-invent itself. My reason for this line of thinking is:-
Nobody in any country has actually costed all the massive upheaval programmes to meet the so called zero targets within the time scales dictated by their parliaments. As we slide further to wards the cliff edge, the human side of the process will come into play with the loss of traditional jobs, infrastructure upheaval, destruction of land amenities to accommodate turbines, solar panels, power lines, eating less red meat and every other madcap policy being trawled by the so called experts. Scientist’s, engineer’s and scholars are sucking their finger testing for the breeze, in an attempt to come up with a plan and figures to cost such a programme. The road to the edge of the cliff is strewn with potholes, craters, minefields, fences and massive fortifications and any government is going to have to spend time, effort and a hell of a lot of taxpayers money to overcome all the problems. A reinvented Labour party could be sitting on the high ground with it’s best snipers and gunners and have a field day every day as the proposed uncosted advance to destruction has financial numbers attached to it. The unions will have to rethink their place in the mix and reinvent themselves as the blue collar, hands on jobs disappear. Labour has to do nothing but plan their ambush guerrilla tactics and let the tory, libdums, and greens walk into the traps set. All the while coming up with a sustainable programme of change.
Labour has nothing to lose they are dead in the water waiting for the final internal explosion to sink them.
If nothing else it would bring back some life into parliament and stop all this hiding behind all this back of a fag packet iffy computer programmes that a lot of the existing members shelter behind 24/7 and encourage open honest debate based on facts and not verses out of the Church of Renewable Saving the World bible.
May 8, 2021
Labour and the Unions have entrenched themselves in the ever growing Public Sector. They don’t need neither supporters or power, just a timid Tory Party. Which they have š
May 8, 2021
Labourās plan to extend the congestion charge across the whole of London is a case in point. It is an economically damaging policy which will never happen.
John, I suggest you talk to Surrey County Council Roads Department and ask they tall to the other Home Counties about setting up a reciprocal congestion charge for those exiting London. But wait until Khan has gone to expense of sealing off all the small roads first.
That will effectively put Londoners under siege and unable to enjoy the country side or travel around the M25. But oh what a joy to see the Labour bubble in London effectively creating a Passport to Pimlico style elitist bubble. Perhaps the metropolitan elitists will suddenly realise their bubble is now a prison.
This would make great TV with you threatening to besiege London elitists like a great general.
May 8, 2021
I have had further thoughts on setting up a Home Counties Congestion Charge. To save costs (1) wait until London has sealed off their own roads (2) use a page on the Home County websites to submit a freedom of information request on behalf of residents to confirm the carās owners location. (3) Pass this information to the congestion charge service provider. Use any profits to give discounts to people paying the London congestion charge.
Given London claim more people travel into London than out of London then they would have no complaint.
May 8, 2021
We are in the incredible situation that the party that has destroyed more businesses and livelihoods than any in history is claiming more economic competence than the opposition. I suppose since that opposition has cravenly supported every single removal of rights and freedoms the Tory party has done they can’t exactly claim the moral high ground but these are dark days indeed.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
I don’t remember much about Tories sleeping in the wrong bed, I recall it was more about cash for questions in 1997. xxxxxxx
Nick Thomas Symonds just on TV. No wonder Labour find it difficult to get their message across – all I heard was “blah, blah, blah”. Even his name is too much to remember.
May 8, 2021
A classical example of how to lose an election by slagging off your opponent. It is also an illustration that one does not ask your lawyer to negotiate a deal for you as they get bogged down in the detail and all this was aided and abetted by the left-leaning media desperately seeking readership and audience ratings. It has been one big ‘yawn’ for the last two months and there was not a single suggestion from Labour as to how they might do things differently for the benefit of the country
Tony Blair had a much easier target as John Major had less than 5% of Boris’s chrisma which he clearly displayed again in his anti-Brexit protestations.
Despite being overwhelmed with the pandemic just days after winning the 2019 election Boris has got a lot done to improve the economic future right across the country and almost daily we are getting good examples of the benefit of standing on own two feet and regaining our position amongst the leaders in the world.
Boris has foresight and picks the right people for the task in hand and he leaves the detail to them. You don’t helm the ship by diving down into the engine room every 5 minutes.
May 8, 2021
I just hope we donāt have to spend the next decade squabbling with Scotland over who gets what. It simply cannot be good for any nation in the U.K.
May 8, 2021
Lets stop the gloating over the difficulties of the Labour Party and deal with the more important issues of resolving the many Brexit challenges. The NI problems will not go away likewise Scotland needs to be put on its path to independence – both these problems unless resolved will distract from more or as important aspects of Government. Politicians constantly talk of making the difficult decision – so how about making some.
May 8, 2021
Boris has now achieved two results no other potential leader could have done. Given how close the result looks to be in London, can we have any doubt that had he stood again for Mayor as well as PM, he would be winning it ?
This is not surprising : for all his faults, he at least has a character and presence which Starmer and almost every other Labour MPs simply haven’t got.
But there is great danger ahead : The entire green crap agenda is so hugely expensive that it is unsustainable and nobody in any party is even questioning it.
Our economy is at the severest of risk : Just consider what has to done to make the green agenda work :
1. The complete replacement of all gas boilers by 2040 with some form of electric heating.
2. The replacement of our car fleet with much more expensive and inconvenient electric cars by 2040
3. The infrastructure for charging at least 10-20 million electric cars by 2035-40
4. Replacement of all of our Nuclear stations that are coming to the end of their lives by 2050.
5. Electricity generation for most energy needs which already costs four times the price of gas per kW.
6. Expensive duplication of generating capacity for when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine.
7. A programme of home and business insulation which will be both difficult and expensive to be effective.
This tsunami of cost over such a short period is not remotely affordable and even if it were, the average household cannot possibly afford the resulting energy bills. As an example, the electricity cost from Hinkley Point, if it is ever finished, is already fixed at more than six times the current price of electricity.
If we actually try to go ahead with all this, other countries, particularly outside Europe, will not and as a result, our economy will be so uncompetitive that our balance of payments will go through the roof. With every UK political party fully signed up for all this, I can see nothing but disaster ahead.
May 8, 2021
Don’t confuse “character” ` and “flanneler”
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
The count is still under way but current analysis suggests that the English councils vote will result in less than 100 councillors for the Green Party and zero control of any council or less than 0.05%ā¦ā¦.so why are we following their policies when the people donāt vote for them ?
May 8, 2021
Exactly. Total insanity from Boris. Will not even save CO2 just export it in practise. CO2 is not a serious problem anyway.
May 8, 2021
Yes, the economy has a big part to play in making up voter’s mind, but we shouldn’t forget the part the media plays.
Probably because Boris didn’t stick to his promise to ‘do something’ about the BBC, they in particular have been giving him a good press, despite all the things wrong with the government’s activities over this pandemic and the disasters with BREXIT, not to mention his inane green policies…..
Without the media on side for the Tories this election would have been very different, probably not for labour, for the media have not been showing labour in a good light as they usually do – with more seats going to the other socialist parties.
Talking of how Blair got into power, we all surely must remember that campaign to make fox hunting illegal. Labour were behind it and it was constantly in the news, showing what a respectable party labour were under Blair and how they had changed…. So yes, with the Tories taking a hit on credibility for black Wednesday and the foxes, Blair walked in.
Let’s never underestimate the power of propaganda, which the MSM now has down to a fine art.
May 8, 2021
I think it will be interesting to see what happens once GBNews gets going. It will likely give a home to rational argument against the current media propaganda lines. That will mean no free ride, and much better counter-argument, and a proper platform for sensible alternative views..
May 8, 2021
The Fox hunting things was easy as no one who took part would likely to vote New or Old Labour and, even if they did, the loss in votes would be outweighed by those gained.
May 8, 2021
Methinks the missing story in all this is the history of the Scottish economy as similar to those other deprived economic Development Regions needing attention where the “Red Wall” still exists deep down and need attention.
Whilst London and the South grew with the digital age there were many “Left Behinds” that Labour could only throw benefits at for decades with the benefit of North Sea oil – only developed with British investment and risk.
The regional economic divisions still exist and are still unresolved and exploited to the hilt by emotional turmoil in Scotland. Unless you have been there you miss the problem. Whilst Sir Keir Starmer experienced “Get out of my pub!” recently Boris also got rebuked with ” Get off my land! ” in Scotland mis-judging the mood.
The late surge in SNP voting was due to emailing voters in Voting Day at 8am and 6pm asking people friends and family help them to vote to “Save Scotland” . This really needs regulating like ending campaigning days before Election Day….. But maybe impossible with hacker interference from abroad etc…
May 8, 2021
I cannot see any reason why any Party should not contact voters on election day – it is completely legal to ‘knock up’ voters in person on the day, and to distribute leaflets to their homes reminding them to vote.
It is illegal to campaign immediately outside polling stations, however.
May 8, 2021
It is the economy stupid but I do hope that no one in your party thinks this indicates an increase in support for the Conservatives or their current policies. It is a vote against Labour best summed up by Khalid Mahmood “A London-based bourgeoisie, with the support of brigades of woke social media warriors, has effectively captured the party.
“They mean well, of course, but their politics ā obsessed with identity, division and even tech utopianism ā have more in common with those of Californian high society than the kind of people who voted in Hartlepool yesterday.
“The loudest voices in the Labour movement over the past year, in particular, have focused more on pulling down Churchillās statue than they have on helping people pull themselves up in the world.”
You party would do well to pay heed to these wise words, dial down the climate rhetoric and pay attention to your base and target demos. All the talk of levelling up needs to have substance behind it. Ditch the minorities and climate for a while please.
May 8, 2021
The real shame is that the people of Hartlepool did not vote outside the usual suspects on Thursday. That would truly have set the cat among the pigeons.
May 8, 2021
@Narrow Shoulders – London-based bourgeoisie, with the support of brigades of woke social media warriors
To me that sums up this Conservative Government to a ‘T’ they support these leftish metro agendas with no thought in to having a strong economy first and foremost.
You can have all you wish for, if before the throw away promises you define where and how it will be paid for and actually start creating the wealth.
May 8, 2021
It is equally important that every region is treated with the same importance to the economy contributing and investment however difficult.
May 8, 2021
Aware that asking Labour what it now stands for would be futile (since it does not know) I was hoping to hear something from you. Labour really does feel at home with “negative stories and carping attitudes” and it has ignored what the people’s Blue Boris achieved at the last general election by offering optimism and confidence in a decent future (something the Conservatives should not lose sight of now). (It is one of the remarkable phenomenon of modern politics that Boris was so easily able to obliterate from public memory the appalling T. May government).
As for “… Conservative fortunes plunged from September 6 1992 when the UK fell out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism and had to acknowledge its economic policies had failed…”, Major & Lamont and the whole Government should have heeded your early warnings, shouldn’t they!
May 8, 2021
Whilst the economy may most of the time be the most important issue it can be trumped as evidenced by the fact that many people voted to leave the EU despite being told by everyone it would lead to economic disaster.
The labour Party has lost many patriotic working class voters who no longer wish to vote for a party of international socialists, EU supporters and woke metropolitan elites and dislike being constantly scolded for being stupid, ignorant and xenophobic.
They are not happy with Mr. Brownās ābigoted womanā quip, nor with Mr. Starmerās taking the knee to BLM or indeed his years of efforts working with the EU to overturn the democratic vote to leave.
At the very least the Labour Party will need a leader who is patriotic and is seen to be working for the country.
May 8, 2021
Blown up so called sleaze is very 20th century. If we are talking about breaking the law that is different. The small minds which perpetuate this rubbish get issues confused. Other outdated and silly stances are those appealing to a class system derived from feudal days. How stupidly patronising to call people ‘the workers’.Everyone who earns money are workers. Those who don’t are the unemployed or retired and by trying to classify ‘the worker as in a slightly lower strata of society and thereby attempting to elevate themselves is astoundingly pathetic.
And these grown ups still playing teenage alpha games dating back to when they were 18 yrs old and saying’ my degree is better than yours ‘ and’ I got a first , what did you get ?’ The lives of most intelligent people are not based upon a few years as an adolescent . This posing is not going to attract level headed people to vote for them with throw a back performance from ‘ the old times.’
May 8, 2021
No, it’s not the economy. It’s Brexit. You don’t parachute a frantic Remain into a constituency which voted 69% Leave and expect to win. Especially as Remain loves to characterise Leaves as stupid xenophobes (etc) – oddly enough Leave voters are not endeared by this.
May 8, 2021
You make a key point. Labour are a highly moralizing party, and voters just are not amused at being labelled morally defective by Labour MPs who are just selling this week’s fad in politics, and who will be selling a different fad in a month or two.
May 8, 2021
I agree. And as others here have alluded to, the days of pinning a Red Rosette to a donkey and expecting people to vote for it may now be passing. Something I hope for.
May 8, 2021
Boris is making a strategic mistake in rejecting Sturgeon’s call for a second independence referendum.
Whatever we think about the Nationalists, they will have a mandate from the Scottish electorate after this weekend and to deny them another vote is an unsustainable position and will stoke up resentment, and not just from those currently in the independence camp. Boris will simply be playing into their hands .
Election experts are saying that the chances of keeping Scotland in the Union are greatest if a vote was held sooner rather than later. Allowing Sturgeon another two to three years to put her ducks in a row is not going to enhance the chances of defeating her. We know that Sturgeon has no answers to the issues of currency and the deficit, so better for Boris to schedule another vote for summer 2022 and start to ensure Scottish voters fully understand the financial disaster that awaits them.
May 8, 2021
@ChrisS ā It would be good to keep the Union together. But the SNP are a separatist one agenda party and if that is what the Scots want we must permit it to happen. Otherwise it is no different from Labour insulting Hartlepool by telling after its all done and dusted staying in the EU is what you will get with us.
May 8, 2021
Correct – just imagine if the EU said that the UK couldn’t have a referendum to leave the EU ?
May 8, 2021
On this occasion Boris Johnson has the law on his side, while Nicola Sturgeon is the one flirting with a brazen breach of the rule of law. The Scottish Parliament and government are the creatures of the UK Parliament and as defined by the Scotland Act 1998 the scope of their official activities does not extend to include anything to do with separation of Scotland from the United Kingdom. That would require an exception to be made through a Section 30 order approved by the UK Parliament, as was done for the 2014 referendum:
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/whats-the-process-for-a-second-independence-referendum-in-scotland/
In that document Nicola Sturgeon is quoted as follows:
“We may get into the situation where the UK Government says, āNo, weāre not going to agree the section 30 order,ā and I think if that happens we need to rise above that, we need to make the case of how unreasonable that is.”
In my view what is unreasonable is to demand a repeat referendum on the grounds that withdrawal from the EU will have a hugely damaging effect on Scotland when we still don’t know what overall effect it will have and the SNP are just taking Remainer scaremongering as established fact.
May 8, 2021
To Denis and nota# :
I agree with both of you, it would certainly be better for Scots for the Union to be maintained and, yes, the law is on Boris’ side. However, I don’t believe it is sustainable to reject another referendum request given the outcome of this election has given a clear mandate to hold another one.
What Boris must do is set out the terms of exit and the consequences of staying within the union and then allowing another vote, on condition that, if unsuccessful, the Nationalists sign up to there not being another vote on it for at least 30 years.
The consequences of staying in the Union are that the Barnett formula must end and Scotland can have full autonomy over tax and spend but with no subsidy from English taxpayers.
May 9, 2021
The election was for members of a devolved assembly which does not have the legal competence to make decisions about anything related to the union, on the contrary by its founding enactment it is expressly restricted from attempting to do so and technically any of its members who abused the facilities provided at public expense to even discuss such matters would be guilty of misconduct in public office. This should have made clear long ago, and then we would not have commentators like Beth Rigby at Sky talking about Boris Johnson potentially “blocking” a referendum as if the Scottish bodies have the right to promote a referendum but he would stand in the way. Absent a Section 30 order it is the law that would stand in the way, not Boris Johnson or the Tories or the English.
May 8, 2021
Another of your revisionist political histories, which does – this time – contain an element of truth. However, the poor performance of Labour in last week’s elections had more to do with the billions and billions Sunak and the Treasury have printed to pay for the popular furlough scheme and the success of the vaccination program.
Effectively, the furlough system is a derivation of the old DHSS earnings-related income support scheme which was targeted at working-class unemployed and was popular in the 1960s when we had nearly full employment.
Furlough pays up to 80% of pre-pandemic income to the middle classes, so they can continue servicing their mortgage/rent/student loan/car finance/credit card minimum payments – and save up for their next foreign beach holiday. A classic electoral bribe in the Nicola Sturgeon SNP mould. The humungous sums printed have gone on the national debt, now in excess of Ā£2 trillion. When the Conservatives regained power ten years ago, it stood at “only” Ā£1 trillion.
When inflation rises (and it has started to) forcing the BoE to raise interest rates, we will reap the consequences – the mother of all depressions. Those who have no debt to service and who hold hard assets will preserve their wealth. The rest will be digging up their gardens to grow their own food.
May 8, 2021
Whilst I agree that the economy is important, I believe it is trumped by any Constitutional issue especialy Sovereignty. Witness the tactical voting in the Scottish Parliament Elections. People have voted to exercise their Constitutional view, even if it meant voting against their party political beliefs.
Whatever Labourās failings on the economy or other stratergy, they behaved by in an undemocratic way against ordinary voters on a serious Constitutional issue.
May 8, 2021
@NoTabove – It would be good to keep the Union together. But the SNP are a separatist one agenda party and if that is what the Scots want we must permit it to happen. Otherwise it is no different from Labour insulting Hartlepool by telling after its all done and dusted staying in the EU is what you will get with us.
May 8, 2021
I agree entirely. I accept that there will be a time for a referendum when it would not be disrespectful to those who voted to stay in the Union in 2014. I would be disappointed if they left the UK but I would support their choice.
May 8, 2021
No.
It is socialism and Stockholm Syndrome.
It seems that voters just want to be looked after and given free stuff.
The education system has succeeded in its task.
Let responsibility and self determination go hang.
Whichever of our two identical twin parties ( apparently) offers more freebies.
Like pay for no work.
That party wins!
What will happen when the cornucopia of debt and indebtedness runs dry?
May 8, 2021
Everhopeful. That’s why the SNP is so loved. From what I hear Boris is ready to throw more money at the Scots so more freebies on the way while we pay for more. No wonder the SNP is popular whether they get independence or not. It’s a win, win.
May 8, 2021
One of the SNP MP’s was on Politics Today last week and he sat there smugly smiling while discussions about social care in England was going on and actually had a Cheshire cat grin on his face when it was stated that the English have to sell their homes to go into care. Then he had the audacity to say that Scotland was far ahead of England on this subject as nobody was forced to sell their home. I sat aghast that nobody else on the panel including the woman chairing the discussion had the intelligence to say that it helped when they get more money through the Barnett formula for the extra perks they enjoy paid for by others. No wonder independence is a lost cause for us, not that I will be sorry to see them go.
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
F U S
+1
May 8, 2021
Correct. We are witnessing nothing less than slimy, lying political slugs bribing voters with their own money and the wealth of future generations.
I am tired of this shameless, immoral deceit, this bullshit. This attack on personal responsibility and on self reliance. All that scum Labour encourage (state dependency and woke fascism, hatred of and collective punishment of the majority, white misandry etc etc) has been embraced by the Tories as they pander on all fours to the vicious race and feminist lobbies.
When this all blows up and totalitarianism is imposed (internet restrictions, cashless society, more Anti-speech laws and the fear incited by arresting anyone who dares to step out of line) those who voted for scum Labour and the faux Tories will be too blame
The British people have sold their clueless, ignorance soul for a free-lunch offered up by grotesque, exploitative, brutal politicians whose thirst for power and control is unmatched only by their stupidity
May 8, 2021
Agreed.
May 8, 2021
Any party that is brave enough to stand up and tell the truth about the cost of the climate change act crap will get the attention of the voter. People do want to do the best for the planet but many don’t believe, for good reason, the rhetoric that is being spewed out by the likes of Greta and her merry followers. Looking at the weather here now, without CO2 we are going to experience cold conditions which will be no good for growing food etc. We don’t even know what all the measure being brought in will do anyway. Nobody has been able to prove that anything will get better. Not much has changed during lockdown with less emissions so who’s to say all this expensive rubbish will change anything. People need to understand – really understand what is being asked of them. It all sounds lovely but the bill at the end of it won’t be. The solutions to cheaper and sustainable, secure energy is there already. Goodness knows we have discussed it enough on this site. It’s up to politicians to listen to common sense, stop pandering to the pie in the sky Greens and get on with solutions which will be financially beneficial to the country and stop people living a miserable existence. Lets have a government with ideas and vision. If Labour manage to do this, why hell, I may even vote for them.
May 8, 2021
Oh dear the countries entire Hitachi high speed trains fleet have been taken out of service, what a shambles.
Public sector procurement at its best eh.
May 8, 2021
@Iain Gill – made me smile to. Up until now the British rail fleet was implied to be that British, no one mentioned before they are just assembled in the UK old Tech from Japan. Just as HS2 is intending to be. the rest of the World moves on and the UK invests in the Past
May 8, 2021
innovation in rail transport for the UK HS2 design is sinking the rails into a concrete bed ….
May 8, 2021
Funny, I read about HitachiRail UK, Rock Rail East Midlands plc, Abellio UK, John Laing Group, Agility Trains West ā¦ is that really what you call āpublic procurementā?
Has the rolling stock not been put in private hands between 1994 and 1997 and continued to be as ROSCOs?
May 8, 2021
The BBC seem to be talking about Labour’s failure as though it’s the BBC’s difficulty too. Their analysts seem to be almost saying “What can *we* do about this ?”
Lower the voting age to 10 and ship in a load of poor people ???
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
Labour Party 1970s vs 2021
1970 anti nuclear weapons pro CND ā 2021 pro nuclear weapons
1970 anti the EEC European union ā 2021 pro EU
1970 pro mining industry ā 2021 anti mining industry
1970 pro petrol/diesel car manufacture ā 2021 anti petrol/diesel car manufacture
1970 pro the monarchy ā 2021 anti the monarchy
1970 pro indigenous working class ā 2021 pro immigration
1970 pro victims rights ā 2021 pro criminal rights
1970 pro cleaning beaches/ streets ā 2021 pro banning everything
Its easy to see how the Labour Party lost its way and many votesā its just not the same partyā¦..and guess what folks, the same thing is happening to the Tory Party
May 8, 2021
Glen Cullen
Correct, and the voters are blissfully unaware of the major part theyāre playing in the tragedy!
May 8, 2021
+1
Seduced and bamboozled by shape shifters!
May 8, 2021
+1
May 8, 2021
Good post, and much truth.
May 8, 2021
Sir John – its OK to ‘crow’ (if that the right word)
But a bit of realism in needed. If you send in an arch Remainer to Hartlepool, if you did not permit the local party to have a choice. Not only do the good people of Hartlepool resent it, the local activist from Labour also say what’s the point – why bother.
I agree ‘Itās the economy stupid’ is always the prime importance, but lets not forget the Government is so far demonstrating its wish to destroy the UK’s economy and keep themselves toeing the line with Brussels – Not exactly leave is it!.
It is reported in the MsM that ‘some’ Conservatives have said the Government must keep pressure on the WOKE agenda and that Labour lost because of its Metro stance and disdain of the rest of the Country. The exact comments that most of us suggest is the big failing of this Centralist Controlling Government. Conservatives and Labour are in complete step, pushing the same leftish agenda and not putting ‘Itās the economy stupid’ first and foremost on the agenda.
Most of the Political Class/Elite also forget Elections are never Won they are always Lost. Its the least worst option we actually choose.
May 8, 2021
Your last sentence is significant, but by Sunday Boris and his cabinet members will be on every media outlet in triumph telling us how great they are and continue along there disastrous path
May 8, 2021
Conservative electoral success (and Labour failure) is based on TWO factors: economics and values – and both of these flow directly from Brexit. Let’s take ‘values’ first: The most important poll yesterday was not related to ANY of the elections but instead was one that showed that while in France and Germany those on the Left of politics were just as proud of their countries as those on the right, in the UK there was a chasm of difference, with only 17% of those on the Left being proud of Britain, as opposed to 58% of those on the Right.
This brings to mind the words of George Orwell (no Tory he) who said: “England is perhaps the only great country whose intellectuals āØare ashamed of their own nationality. In left-wing circles it is always āØfelt that there is something slightly disgraceful in being an Englishman āØand that it is a duty to snigger at every English institution”. Labour’s failure stems from the fact that it has been captured by this ‘intellectual’ mindset, and this does NOT reflect the attitude and values of the majority of ordinary people. We are proud to be British because Britain is the greatest country in the world, and we are the greatest people in the world. If you do not agree wholeheartedly and without ANY reservation with that statement you will never be able to empathise with a majority of the population of the country.
The Left want Britain in the EU because they believe that foreigners can run our country better than we can. It is the Left who are the REAL ‘little Englanders’ – they think our country is too little and weak to thrive outside the EU. And this leads to economics. The Conservative government is putting forward proposals they claim will make Brexit Britain a huge economic success, such as freeports, green jobs, investment in science, and new trade deals. Whether you agree that these policies will succeed is not the issue – what is important is that the government at least has a POSITIVE plan to make Brexit a success. Labour does not. So the only option is to give the Conservatives the chance to put their plan into practice. The only idea that anyone on the Left ever comes up with is to get back in bed with the EU, rejoining either the Customs Union or the Single Market. But that would, quite literally, be a retrograde step, an admission of defeat, of failure and of our inability to thrive on our own. The people do not want that. They want a plan that takes us FURTHER away from the EU, so that we are completely free and independent. What part of ‘Take Back Control’ does the Left not understand?
The public want politicians to make Brexit a huge success. The Left say that’s not possible. Who the hell is going to vote for defeatists like that? Give us a plan that makes Britain both completely free and economically successful. And if you can’t, you may as well get out of politics.
May 8, 2021
Is Labour rattled though?
There are rumours of a leadership challenge.
May 8, 2021
Net Zero and climate treaties are today’s ERM and EU membership. Only when we begin to see the real effects will people start to wake up to the folly they represent. The parallels are remarkably close. Technical measures that few politicians understand, and subjugation to international rules that the UK will observe to the letter while the others ignore them. It’s already been shown that the recent Japanese pledge is completely unattainable, for example.
Brexit should be a warning that the political climate can change very rapidly, and much faster than the climate itself does.
May 8, 2021
Aha! The economy. Where are the gains from Brexit I hoped for? It’s no good saying FTA’s. In the main others benefit more than we do, since we can import the vast majority of the many things we don’t make ourselves.
And where are the real sovereignty gains? What has ‘Boris’ done to protect, defend and promote our fisheries? Nothing. We’ll find out in a few weeks how much he has secretly given in to the French thugs after all the pretending to be tough. He’s all pretence because we see no gains anywhere.
May 8, 2021
@The Prangwizard – once Covid becomes a way of life ‘Boris’ will get punished for his failure to take the UK out of the EU. His rewarding the EU with everything they desired, with their ability to sell into the UK while excluding what we sell to them. Letting the EU take all the fish they need from the UK territory and not reciprocating. Letting the EU tear NI away from the UK – its a massive list of one failure after another. All the UK Electorate voted for was to leave the EU and take responsibility for ourselves, not take what you want and we will accept our punishment.
May 8, 2021
Fire Bill: Is also a UXB.
Imposing costs on leaseholders which they were not at fault is perpetuating the feudal system of entitlement and a leasehold underclass. The economic hit could be large as the the large bills hit. Mortgages, service charges,council taxes are not small expenses. This could financially trap and destroy a lot of people. Making them dependent for life. Possibly in a nice Tory way though. Forfeiture allows undeserving windfall gains. The new homeless will still be liable for the debts,all the while being potentially blameless. Nice bit of legal footwork.
Government needs to fund the entire cost. Freeholds of the effected properties need to compulsory acquired and put into a national common-hold structure. The leaseholders can then manage via right to manage or an appointed agent or national body answerable to leaseholders.
Wonder who they will vote for?
May 9, 2021
Perhaps there is a fear of judicial review of net zero policies that impose uneconomic insulation that may have other undesired effects from poor safety through damp and mould etc.
The energy saving at Grenfell Tower would have taken over 200 years to pay for itself before financing costs.
May 8, 2021
nota#
+1
May 8, 2021
Off topic, JR, why does the UK government not lay it on the line that whatever her personal views on the matter Nicola Sturgeon’s “job” does not include anything to do with Scottish independence?
From Section 29 of the Scotland Act 1998:
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1998/46/section/29
“(1) An Act of the Scottish Parliament is not law so far as any provision of the Act is outside the legislative competence of the Parliament.
(2) A provision is outside that competence so far as any of the following paragraphs apply …
… (b) it relates to reserved matters … ”
And from Schedule 5:
“1 The following aspects of the constitution are reserved matters, that is …
… (b) the Union of the Kingdoms of Scotland and England …”
And guess whose signature is on the Edinburgh Agreement, below that of Alex Salmond?
https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20130102230945/http://www.number10.gov.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Agreement-final-for-signing.pdf
“The governments have agreed to promote an Order in Council under Section 30 of the Scotland Act 1998 in the United Kingdom and Scottish Parliaments to allow a single question referendum on Scottish independence to be held before the end of 2014. The Order will put it beyond doubt that the Scottish Parliament can legislate for that referendum.”
“4. The Order enables the Scottish Parliament to legislate for a referendum that takes place at any point before the end of 2014.”
The power delegated to the devolved authorities was just for that referendum, not for a repeat referendum because the SNP lost that one and want to have another go, and she signed up to that.
May 8, 2021
Sir John,
Another factor in Labour’s lack of electoral success prior to 1993 was being burdened with the leadership of Neil Kinnock. Having led Labour through two general elections and lost both times, he subsequently and inexplicably went off to Brussels as an EU commissioner. That was when I first began to understand the reality underlying the European Union, and the commission in particular.
May 8, 2021
Its the economy ‘Stupid’ unless you are playing to the WOKE audience, which this Government is.
The UK is to go Green by increasing the amount of import of very expensive energy from the EU. The UK is going Green by moving more and more production to parts of the World that have different things to worry about. The UK Government has at its core the ideal of we get to import everything, so reducing World emissions?
Out of the 7.8 billion people on this Planet 67million will pay for the ego of their WOKE Government with their livelihoods, jobs and future just so as a lovely cuddly headline can be produced. You can have anything you want if in the first instance you create the means to pay for it. Paying others to do produce without the funding to pay for it just doesn’t work. In this age of the ‘Millennial'(entitlement before achievement, lack of self reliance)we have the first ‘Millennial’ Government that believes in entitlement for their aspirations is a given right it will be provided for just ‘because’
Do all those lovely people that are to supply the UK with its basics to survive – care! Not at all, as long as they get paid. That’s the bit were there is a failure to grasp what causes a future.
This week with the same thinking on economic matters as the UK Government, Joe Biden suggested that vaccine patents should be given away. Then some one pointed out that over a 1,000 companies raced to produce a vaccine, with less than 5% achieving a result. So billions invested in hope. What would the commitment be if at a future date any financial gamble taken by industry was just given a way.
So every time Its the economy ‘Stupid’. For the UK that means what we can do ourselves we should do, we should be in the first place self-reliant.
This Government is treating the people of the UK as Children, they need to be beholden to their masters so they can be controlled. The Election Gains will quickly go down the drain with that attitude, its about releasing people from the constraints of Governments, allowing them to do what is best for them. The one size fits all mentality is as always flawed, everyone can do a better job for themselves, their families and their communities than any Centrally Control freakery Government. The PM on present form will be the one that looses the next election
May 8, 2021
According to todays MsM 70% of the taxpayer subsidised manufacture of wind farm facilities is with foreign manufacturing. The UK’s ‘green’ future is coming from elsewhere at the cost of UK jobs and taxes.
May 8, 2021
Far too much complexity being voiced here.
Remember the KISS technique – keep it simple stupid ?
One political party has done well using it . All that is needed –
1. Promise new bikes for some kids.
2.Own up to mistakes as soon as you see you can not get away with it.
3.Say all main manifesto matters will be dealt with later since you are too busy putting the wheels back on the bus which was gifted to you .
4…………space left for you dear reader to add anything further.
May 8, 2021
Well now (Sturgeon ed) will be able to turn the screws really hard the best thing for Boris on Monday morning is put tenders out for the following:-
The supply and installation of a border wall complete with traffic crossing points on motorways and major roads.
The complete relocation of all existing MoD bases across Scotland.
The renovation of Plymouth Naval Base to accommodate and service Trident submarines and their personnel.
The cost savings for the cessation of subsidies and constraint payments on all Scottish Renewable installations.
The savings on the payment of the Barnet Formula.
The relocation of all government offices back to England.
The English pound remains just that English.
All oil extracted from British oil fields sited in international waters where possible to be terminated into English refineries.
This would be the starter for ten and would bring out into the open the full extent of the financial support that they get from being part of the union. It also sends clear signals to the Scottish people that England ain’t going to roll over and be a pasty to their leader of the devolved parliament.
Nothing personal it’s just business
May 8, 2021
Hi Turboterrier,
a) Since taxes do not fund government spending. The only constraint is the skills and real resources Scotland has. Then they need decide how they are going to use those skills and real resources without causing inflation.
b) None of what you posted would hurt Scotland.
Scotland could set up a treasury, central bank and then start issuing the new currency and announce a job guarentee. Have full employment at the drop of a hat . Benefit not only Scotland but everyone else on these islands as well. All that juicy aggregate demand waiting to be turned into profits.
Problem is they want to be at the heart of Europe so it’s not independence at all. Brussels would determine their budgets and thus determine how they would have to use their skills and real resources. That’s just another version of currency slavery.
When they launch the new currency and say to the Scottish private sector give us your new currency so we can spend or give us your new currency so we can borrow. Nobody has any of the new currency yet.
They have to spend the new currency into existence first. So that the private sector can then pay their taxes. Even the Romans knew that with their coinage.
Government spending comes first then taxes are collected as that spending flows through the economy. Your spending is someone else’s income in the chain , so all of the government spending comes back to source where it is cancelled like a rally stick at the BOE. The budget is balanced.
Unless, of course somebody in the spending chain decides to save some of their income and not spend all of it. That’s called a government budget deficit. Everybody who saved some of their income added together. The private sector “surplus.”
If those savers decide to swap their Ā£ for a bond that’s called the national debt. Everybody’s savings swapped for a government bond. When those savers want to spend their savings and spend it. They swap the bond back into a Ā£. The national debt is reduced. A simple asset swap.
The SNP are liars. They have yet to explain to the Scottish people who enjoy a government budget deficit of probably 10% of GDP after the virus. That is a private sector ( household and business) 10% of GDP surplus by introducing a universal basic income which is a crazy idea.
Into a private sector 2% of GDP surplus. That the growth Commission suggests.
They would have to slash government spending and increase taxes to reduce the private sector surplus from 10% of GDP to 2% of GDP. It would destroy the economy. Rural areas would be hit hardest then pensions would be cut to meet the stability and growth pact rules with unemployment everywhere.
The EU fiscal rules are good at that. They turn rural areas into economic deserts. Why most rural areas in the Eurozone turn to the far right or populist parties. They step in and appeal and play on their prejudices.
If Scotland rejoins the EU. Give it a few years rural Scotland will be voting for the far right. You can’t slash a private sector surplus by that much in a country that likes to save and get away with it. The Tories found out that the hard way and so did Labour.
May 9, 2021
Your argument seems to be that a fast and large reduction in the budget deficit will bring about economic hardship but that the opposite will bring nothing but benefit.
Yet economic history shows numerous nations finding that printing huge amounts of magic money also brings about economic hardship.
What would happen to the markets relative value of the Scottish pound to the US Dollar and the Pound Sterling as their money supply is rapidly and excessively increased?
May 9, 2021
And I like your clever idea to create full employment by the State just issuing a job guarantee.
Presumably BHS and Debenhams, for example, would just carry on trading.
May 9, 2021
If Maggie had introduced a job guarentee ( transition job) when she moved skills and real resources from mining, ship building into services and high end manufacturing.
The Tories would be in power for the next 100 years.
May 9, 2021
How does a government successfully give a job guarantee for employees in private sector businesses in a competitive industry.
Answer my question.
May 9, 2021
No not really peter.
A government budget deficit aka a private sector surplus that is too small causes unemployment.
One that is too big can cause inflation.
A job guarentee would be government spending that is targeted and increase in bad times and reduce in good times and act as a better auto stabiliser than we have now. Better than the carpet bombing approach of interest rate targeting. Make companies compete that forces improved productivity that lifts all boats.
More importantly the job guarentee is a transition job back into the private sector that would allow government to move skills and real resources around to meet their industrial policy. Without causing unemployment.
Yes, high streets would look a lot different less charity shops more entrepreneurs.
May 9, 2021
How would I keep my company open when competition from overseas undercuts me?
How does your State jobs guarantee save me and my employees?
May 9, 2021
I note you have not said anything about my question to you about relative currency values.
May 9, 2021
Hi Peter,
“How would I keep my company open when competition from overseas undercuts me? ”
You have that problem now that is nothing new ask Donald Trump it is not the JG job to fix that. There are other ways to fix that. Other government policies could be put in place.
What the JG would do is help you invest to become more productive. Without worrying that the staff you lay off can’t find another job. They could walk into another job the next day and transition into something else in the private sector where they are needed.
Knowing that there is full employment at all times you can plan better. Stop worrying about recessions. Invest long term and reduce your wage bill.
May 9, 2021
Wonderful to know that just by proclaiming a guarantee of employment a govcan achieve full employment.
What a winner !
May 9, 2021
Hi Peter,
“What would happen to the markets relative value of the Scottish pound to the US Dollar and the Pound Sterling as their money supply is rapidly and excessively increased? ”
As always there is a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it. Trust me the SNP would do the wrong way. That is a certainty.
This also goes for the UK as Whole of they ever decide to introduce it.
1. The last thing the ISG ( Independent Scottish government ) should do is convert the sterling debt into the new currency. You donāt want to force conversion. Thereās a right way and a wrong way to do it. You are proposing the wrong way. The right way. You donāt actually leave sterling the ISG simply starts spending and taxing in the new currency. The conversion is on a 1:1 basis. Whatever you taxes and spent in sterling you tax and spend the same amount in the new currency. Now you have independent fiscal policy and independent monetary policy.
2. Donāt force conversion on bank deposits from Sterling to the new currency if people want to hold sterling you let them gold sterling. Letās say half want to keep sterling and half need the new currency to pay their taxes and run their businesses. If you convert everybody to the new currency those people who need sterling will sell the new currency to get sterling the want and it can drop 60%. So you donāt do that. So the sell the new currency to get sterling the central bank doesnāt know what to do so they raise interest rates. Import prices go through the roof with job losses everywhere.
3. Leave it alone everybody is happy those that want sterling have sterling those that want the new currency have the new currency. Those that now need the new currency now have to sell sterling and buy the new currency. That pushes the new currency up not down. Where are these people going to get the new currency when it is scare at this moment time ?
4. From the only place that has it the ISG. The ISG will sell the new currency to these people at a slight premium in exchange for these peopleās sterling. The currency is wanting to get stronger at this point but the ISG will sell enough to keep it stable. Now the ISG is hoarding sterling what are they going to use that sterling for ?
5. To service that sterling debt that you say is going to be a nightmare of course. They will service it over time and manage it and reduce it over time without a collapse in the currency. The simple fact is said debt need be no worse with your own currency, and less of an issue if you have your own currency and sustain higher levels of real domestic output. The sterling debt is a drag on the Scottish economy now but with your own fiscal policy a job guarentee and monetary policy setting the interest rate to zero it can be less of a drag using your own currency.
You are right of course Peter that gamblers in the FX markets will gamble heavily and start shorting the new currency. So there is a danger that the SNP who are clueless will do it the wrong way and the gamblers will run riot in top of that I fully accept that reality.
If people who are in charge do launch it in the correct way then more fool the gamblers. They are going to get burned. Speculators playing silly games laying on shorts in the new currency. They will do so until there is nobody is prepared to take the other side, no soft holders to panic out of their savings and no more flash crashes allowing dealers to close open long positions. In other words until the liquidity drains away until all that is left is that required for the underlying trade flows.
Then you will get the mother of all bear squeezes.currency.
The game, of course, is to tempt the patsy of last resortāāāthe central bankāāāinto the speculation market to throw fresh salmon to the bears. A wise central bank will avoid doing this. Instead it will offer to clear needed trade flows with its reserves on a strict national policy basisāāāfood and power: yes, Learjets: no. It will offer refinancing to firms who have foreign currency loans, as long as they go through administration first so that the foreign currency loan is wiped out and the foreign bank is force to take the loss. A wise central bank would do everything it can to ensure the squeeze stays on track. It would make its intentions knownāāāthere will be no liquidity for speculation outside the ānaturalā supply. And that means, in an over-the-counter market of foreign exchange, liquidity may run out.
A wise central bank understands that is the responsibility of the other central bank with the high currency value and an excess export policy to decide what they want to do. A wise central bank will keeps it head while all around are losing theirs.
May 9, 2021
A very long post which amazingly still avoids answering the real question.
I reckon the real answer is that the Scottish currency would rapidly sink versus other major currencies.
Creating increased import prices, rapid inflation , high levels of unemployment , low growth, perhaps even a deep recession and a brain drain.
But perhaps history isn’t something we should learn from.
May 10, 2021
Nope not at all..
Hi Peter,
As explained not if it is done right.
John never posted my other long reply that explains Creating increased import prices, rapid inflation , high levels of unemployment , low growth, perhaps even a deep recession and a brain drain. Doesn’t happen.
I went into it in detail.
See drop in Ā£ after Brexit for details. I never saw any of those things happen did you ?
The way the SNP plan to do it would cause those things.
May 10, 2021
Morning Peter,
The short version if John allows it as I did cover it in another long post that John probably thought was too long.
Because we all only have a set amount of disposable income every month after we get paid. If import prices increase then our spending habits change. We buy local instead which is good for the UK.
That means the pressure then ends up on the exporters to the UK if they want to keep their market share. They are the ones who face job losses and the difficult choices. Not the UK.
See Irish Mushroom farmers and Irish exporters for details when the Ā£ dropped after the Brexit vote.
It seems again your analysis uses fixed FX which is always the problem. The economic textbooks still use the Kaldorian view point fixed FX.
May 10, 2021
Still avoiding my crucial point about the markets opinion and their inevitable revaluation of a nation’s currency if it tries to print ad infinitum.
If you increase money supply recklessly the markets spot it and downgrade your currency’s value.
Economic History is a proof of this effect.
May 10, 2021
Some imports are unavoidable, steel, oil, gas, timber, pharmaceticals, rare metals and chemicals.
It takes many years to develop home based industries to substitute world suppliers.
If that is even possible.
Meanwhile inflated import prices takes its toll.
And meanwhile the currency continues to depreciate.
May 10, 2021
the word on the streets is that the world wide microchip shortage is likely to continue for a few years… what is John’s views on how we cope with that constraint on our economy?