Prime Ministers usually praise most of the things going on in the country they govern. They make proposals for improvement. They tell us things will be better tomorrow as we follow their lead.
Not this one. He tells us everything about the country and the government is bad. The NHS is broken. There is a societal black hole, meaning the people misbehave. The Treasury does not have enough money. There were āright wing ā riots on the streets. He stresses it is all the fault of the last Conservative government.
It is true many former Conservative voters stayed at home or voted Reform because they were very critical of the last government. They did not go and vote Labour because they thought Labour would make things worse. They are angry about the way the Starmer government runs down the U.K. as well as about the last not very conservative Ā government. They are angry that his changes in his own words will make things worse. They are angry about fuel benefit Ā cuts, about bloated public sector pay awards for well paid train drivers, about more overseas aid, more so called green investment, the continuing failure to control migration , more poor performance of public services and nationalised industries.
The PM may find it is easy to drive down the low polls for his party and himself but more difficult to pull them up again when has punished us enough. Normal PM s do not behave like this as they realise the public doesnāt like gloom and does expect a government who identifies actual or made up holes to fill them in quickly. Labour won a record majority on a very low share of the vote. It was no endorsement of Labour but a scream of anger by Conservative voters that their party had let them down badly over stopping the boats, controlling migration, keeping tax down and avoiding inflation.
The latest polls show Labour down to 30%. They show Reform and the Ā Conservatives together well ahead, Ā but also the big split between the two would still leave both individually trailing Labour. Since the election both Opposition parties are up, Reform by the more. Conservatives still lead Reform.
September 10, 2024
Good morning
With respect Sir John I do not think you are reading the room.
Firstly, the negative comments are designed to create a narrative that major reform must be undertaken to advert a manufactured crisis.
Secondly, it does not matter what the people or the poll numbers say, we are not due for another GE for at least four years.
The PM and the Labour Party are working to a different agenda and making hey while the so called Official Opposition take their time over installing Kemi. Such a silly charade.
Mark my words, unlike the last government, this one knows exactly what it is doing.
Mores the pitty.
September 10, 2024
Mark B
Absolutely correct. Labour is a poisonous and evil cancer. That may sound hyperbolic but past events back up such an accusation. They care not one jot who is harmed by their racial, religious and woke agenda. How do the Tories respond? Well, silence.
God knows Britain will look like in fifty years time but based at current movements, unrecognisable. Those changes will destroy the royal family and lead to massive flight of many identities.
I’ve given up caring. if the Tories refuse (it seems they abet it) to expose Labour’s (Democratic Party adopted the same tactics, Labour’s partners in crime) agenda then what we can we do?
If I hear the vile term ‘far right’ again I fear I shall implode. This repugnant and criminal term being used by a British PM is intended to demonise tens of millions of British citizens including the royal family
The Tories must openly condemn Starmer and take sides in the way Labour do
September 10, 2024
Perhaps it’s fortunate then Dom, that I don’t expect to be around in 50 years š
Something that might suprise Sir John and his readers (it certainly suprised me!) is that the recent ‘strike’ prices for renewable energy (wind farms et al) are quoted in ‘2012’ prices. However, they are actually paid in today’s money (CPI indexed). So to understand what we will actually pay (e.g. what will eventually find its way into our electricity bills) you need to increase the recent auction prices being quoted on TV by 39%!
So the latest cost of off-shore wind isn’t really Ā£73/mwh – it is actually Ā£102/mwh. Floating off-shore wind (which Mr Millbend seems to quite like) is not the already extremely expensive Ā£176/mwh being widely quoted but in fact an astounding Ā£242/mwh. This seems to me to be a tremendous slight of hand by Government. Time to shine a light on this economic suicide!
September 10, 2024
Keep saying things like that and the Druids will have your blood!
September 11, 2024
It’s worst than that Peter – they are after my money! š
September 10, 2024
If only that 80 seat Tory majority had been used to as powerful effect as Starmer has been using his.
Awful times ahead. There is no reason why that should get better again either.
September 10, 2024
Who would have thought that you could manage to be more depressing than Starmer.
No hope then whatsoever.
September 10, 2024
Lynn
Have you ever heard of ‘aversion therapy’ ? You see, to solve a problem you must first understand it. The problem being, people voting for one the LibLabCON triad. If people stopped voting for them and instead voted for others, then we would start to get the democracy we need. Problem is getting people to break their lifelong voting habits. And the only way to do this is make things worse. So worse that people refuse to vote for the LibLabCON.
September 10, 2024
Agree Mark, there is a definite pattern of claiming we have a crisis that Labour need to address. Starmer will then use his majority and the political powers that he has in the civil service to commit to changes that cannot easily be reversed: net-zero power contracts, public sector pay levels, ‘reform’ of the House of Lords, destruction of our oil & gas industry, additional migration into the UK, tie-ups to the EU…. Do I need to go on?
The next right wing government will require a revolution of the State to bring the UK back towards a lower tax, free market, free rights nation. I can’t see that happening with the Tories in charge.
September 10, 2024
Sadly Mark I think you are correct.
Labour know exactly what they are doing and will have 4 years to make that case,
The conservatives are still clueless as to why they lost, and will lose again, simply because they are not real Conservatives, with conservative policeās, aims, or ambitions
September 10, 2024
Policeā¦.policies
September 10, 2024
Very true. When the ‘opposition’ offers nothing, the government party doesn’t need to offer very much.
The Conservatives should have elected a new leader before Parliament restarts. As it is, they’ll begin the new era – conference season, end of the recess – with the same old faces on the front bench, by and large. Not a good look.
September 10, 2024
Yes quite so, the problems ARE now worse off because Starmer is making the existing problems so much worse. I agree, this plan plan is deliberate. There is a plan whose objective is unclear, but we can speculate. Seeing Blair now making comments off, we can see the puppeteer’s plans taking shape. But I think, or hope, he’s 10 years behind the times; populations of Europe are getting tired of the Centre of Incompetence in Brussels.
Sir J’s last para. the PCP/Sunak lost the active conservative voter to Reform because the PCP under May, Johnson and Sunak were not honest nor conservative. The present bunch need to look at this problem.
September 10, 2024
On Brownstone Institute website, they make the following observations,
“What a picture of the world today! So many regimes around the globe – in the West, Europe, Commonwealth countries, Latin America, and Africa – are only loosely hanging onto power, while masses of people are using every peaceful tool available to throw off the yoke.
The roots of this crisis are deep but we know what kicked it off. It was the mass quarantining of the citizens in all countries, followed by the forced injection of a shot most did not want or need and which has done immeasurable harm. The social contract shattered, and even basic functions of government wholly neglected, the crisis was born.
The question is: how does it end? Are there mechanisms in place that enable the toppling of discredited rulers and their replacement by a new class not in the pay of the hegemon?”
Maybe it’s the people who will turn this mess around?
September 10, 2024
Indeed āit does not matter what the people or the poll numbers say, we are not due for another GE for at least four years.ā By which time doubtless they will have allowed children to vote and made other voting changes to benefit Labour.
Nadhim Zahawi yesterday says he is still proud of his Covid āvaccinesā roll out. He has a chem. engineering degree (UCL) & so surely he should be able to read the hugely depressing statistics which clearly show it almost certainly did huge net harm. Giving dangerous largely ineffective new tech. vaccines to the young children and people who had had covid already (& so had zero need of them) was surely criminal? Was he happy that the MRHA vaccine regulators were largely funded by big Pharma (and many members had personal conflicts too) is that not rather a conflict of interest.
He should also be able to work out that Net Zero is insane.
He also thought the potential leaders for Conservative Party leadership showed a wealth of Talent (all are pro the insane net zero religion most and pro-EU too).
September 10, 2024
I wounder if he is as proud of his little brush with HMRC ?
š
September 10, 2024
Blair and Brown did vast damage over their 13 years as PMs, Starmer clearly plans to be even worse. David Starkey surely has this right in his recent videos.
The blame for this lies entirely with the appalling Con-Socialists under Cameron, May, Boris, Sunak who did the complete reverse of what they promised in 4 election manifestos – on immigration, tax levels, the economy, law and order, public services, housingā¦ they got everything wrong on Covid & still pushed the net zero insanity and HS2.
September 10, 2024
I really don’t think this government knows what it is doing. They are driven by ideology, not reality.
I hear today one major recruitment agency announcing vacancies for jobs are down. it seems employers are worried about all the additional employment rights coming down the line. Who knew?
September 10, 2024
Preparation for the big Reset. Starmergeddon is following WEF instructions, he will destroy the last of our manufacturers. He will carpet the country with houses for immigrants and double down on useless renewable energy. By the end of this Parliament the damage will be immense and considering the conservatives laid the groundwork Reform will prosper.
We are seeing the death knells of the uniparty
September 11, 2024
The UK cannot be allowed to be too competitive with the likes of Germany and France, hence the significant increase in corporation tax to match Europe. Next, it will probably be the VAT threshold. Starmer is there to push all the nasties through quickly; he’s 62 years old, so he’s probably already looking forward to the end of one term and then a wealthy retirement on the speaker’s circuits.
September 10, 2024
Indeed Starmer is surely going to be a compete disaster and is indeed doing this on purpose. He is a lawyer and to a man with a hammer everything starts to look like a nail. The last thing needed is rule by dire lefty lawyers.
A good leader needs a working compass and also the ability to inspire people to follow them in this sensible direction. Starmerās compass is 180 degrees out on all issues. Perhaps just as well then that he also lacks the skill to inspire people to follow him on his duff socialist compass direction.
September 10, 2024
āIt [Labourās record majority] was no endorsement of Labour but a scream of anger by Conservative voters that their party had let them down badly over stopping the boats, controlling migration, keeping tax down and avoiding inflation.ā
And āmore so called green investmentā, aka the economy sabotaging Net Zero.
September 11, 2024
If that were the case, Richard, it was a very foolish “scream” because what they will get will be much worse.
September 10, 2024
@Mark B – I would suggest those in the Parliamentary Party will ensure Kemi doesn’t get on the last 2 list. We are not looking at a parliamentary Party in opposition that has any Conservatives left, most appear to support Starmer otherwise they wouldn’t have thrown away an 80 seat majority and all be looking for the continuity of failure.
September 13, 2024
Some of these changes to pension benefits the Tories wouldn’t get through, the left would be out on the streets beating their pots and pans, twitter and facebook would melt down, so Labour has to be in charge to push through the changes.
September 10, 2024
+1. They have 4 years. In less than 4 months they have started a crackdown on the opposition (not the one in Parliament, with their majority they don’t care about that yet). These are not democrats. These are ruthless idealogues. They are dangerous people.
There has been a horrendous attack on free speech (through spurious “anti harm” legislation), the legal system has been undermined by lawfare practised against ordinary people and more prominent dissenters (“2 tier Kier”). The media are propagandists for the government, the judiciary are largely on board, as are all the apparatus of the state including the police.
In 4 years time it might be impossible for the population to mobilise against this tyranny. As for opposition Parties, look at the way they are being persecuted in Poland and Germany to see what is likely to develop here.
September 11, 2024
An attack on ‘free speech’ on the right. On the left, they can carry on as always. Just today, a so-called comedian made very hateful comments on X; Hope not Hate made an incorrect and inciteful tweet about an acid attack; there was a video created of people responding to that. Nothing was done; he just apologised, it was shared by a Labour MP nothing to see there.
September 10, 2024
Spot on Mark B. But Iām not sure if many of the Labour MPs know what Starmer has in store for us!
September 10, 2024
Bizarre indeed but almost all governments do is mad net zero especially so. They encourage EV vehicles when they actually increase net CO2 but now it seems they have traffic lights designed so one car causes all the on the road cars to have to stop and then accelerate away again. This to further increase CO2 and inconvenience all the motorists who pay for all the roads.
Note that cycling and walking are fueled by human food which is a very CO2 inefficient food indeed especially on a typical UK high meat diet. Government web sites sill lie that they produce not direct or indirect CO2 . A full car is certainly more efficient than five bikes fueled as they are by human food about 10 times safer too. Walking even less efficient,
September 10, 2024
Sorry causes one cyclist to stop all the cars (not one car). Red lights a think of the past for cyclists in the Times today. In London rather few cyclists bother with red lights anyway.
September 10, 2024
Not just London, we see cyclists breaking red lights every time we drive on A and B roads in Berks/Oxon.
September 10, 2024
It s all symptomatic of the death throes of Labour. You cannot govern and benefit a whole country when your paymasters are a relatively small part of that country. The financial support of union barons carries a cost that does not disappear at the first tranche of their blackmail demands. Having received the deposit they are lining up for more, and it might not just be money but increased power they are after.
As you say, Starmers labour are on thin electoral ice. Reform came second in 90+ labour seats. Frankly I do not see labour lasting a full term, they are just too devisive. Nor do I see the Tory party, in their current consocialist composition, riding to the rescue on a blue charger. They have already self destructed. Waiting to select the chief mourner.
Reform only need to judge the mood of the electorate, be very careful choosing who represents them, and the field is open for them. By that time the country will be ready to welcome them.
September 10, 2024
One big problem is the media which tend to be left-leaning. The BBC is the main culprit.
September 11, 2024
I rarely disagree with you, Agricola, but on this occasion I believe you’ve overlooked a big change in Labour’s funding. In 2023 Labour received Ā£21.5m in cash, just Ā£5.9m from the trade union movement, compared with Ā£14.5m from companies and individuals ā a huge increase on the previous year. Trade union contributions have dipped slightly, from around Ā£6.9m in 2020 and 2021 to Ā£5.3m in 2022. https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/labour-conservative-party-donations-2023-spending-analysis/ Starmer will not want to lose that massive funding source he now enjoys from a section of the business community, e.g. Ecotricity, a ‘green energy’ firm, which gave Labour Ā£1m.
September 10, 2024
The post mortem is a well trodden path. As for this shower, the only consolation if we are stuck with them for 5 years is that the spectacle of them making a hash of absolutely everything will at least be some entertainment. Other than that, very regrettably, I just don’t care anymore.
September 10, 2024
entertainment? – seems like you enjoy pain?
September 10, 2024
Starmer (thinks he) is demonstrating resolve; is talking down the country so that in due course he can claim to have pulled off a remarkable transformation and he is rewarding “his” voter-base to ensure they don’t cause trouble or go AWOL.
It has been noted in the papers that he is behaving like a Cromwell, leading a Puritan Government. I suspect he is already hated by a large majority.
When it comes to the Not-a-Conservative-Party and Reform, the polls vary and Reform was ahead in a recent one. The Not-a-Conservative-Party can’t win a General Election without Reform. Whether Reform could ever win one without the Not-a-Conservative-Party is debatable. They are now going after Labour in Labour-voting areas so it will depend on whether their offer appeals to both working class conservatives and patriotic Labour voters.
These two recent by-election show the progress they have already made: 26% and 27% of the votes, which is pretty remarkable for a new party with virtually no local organisation, and well ahead of the Tories.
Crewe West (Cheshire East) Council By-Election Result:
š¹ LAB: 43.4% (-18.5)
ā”ļø RFM: 26.1% (New)
š³ CON: 17.0% (-0.7)
šļø CF: 8.5% (-11.8)
š GRN: 4.9% (New)
Priory (Swale) Council By-Election Result:
š¶ LDM: 42.5% (-12.1)
ā”ļø RFM: 26.9% (New)
š³ CON: 20.6% (-3.5)
š¹ LAB: 10.0% (-3.6)
September 10, 2024
I want to hear the conservative parliamentary party and the leadership contenders telling us that they need to reunite with the reform voters and the reform leadership ….they need to recapture the lost tory voters
September 10, 2024
Reunite? that ain’t going to happen.. the two are basically poles apart. The ‘lost’ tory voters were in denial, how do we get the horrific Labour out with so many sheep dozing in the field?
September 10, 2024
Sir John, as a fellow conservative, can I ask? Who you are supporting in the current Tory leadership contest?
Reply I may write about that at some future date. Let the MPs take it down to 4.
September 10, 2024
reply to reply….and what of the poor choice for the members? Pick the difference, if you can detect it!
September 11, 2024
so far only one fifth voted for the leading prospect….maybe not very popular with the rest when elected!
Truss all over again?
September 10, 2024
There is a huge hole in UK finances that successive governments have made deeper. The Starmer government will dig the hole even deeper, based on its announcements on energy and its hostility to wealth creation. The fall from 1st world status will accelerate under Starmer. He lacks the ability and character, let alone policies or public support, to carry through the fundamental reforms needed to rebuild the UK.
September 10, 2024
You say:- It was no endorsement of Labour but a scream of anger by Conservative voters that their party had let them down badly over stopping the boats, controlling migration, keeping tax down and avoiding inflation.ā
Indeed and Sunak and the BoE deliberately caused the inflation with QE, net harm lockdowns, vast government waste during lockdowns, net harm vaccines, PPE corruption, HS2, millions of worthless degrees, vast low skilled legal immigration and a failure even to attempt to stop the boat arrivals plus Sunak was almost as mad as Miliband in pushing the insanity of Net Zero. Sunak also, totally idiotically, went to the country 6 months early.
September 10, 2024
Perhaps I can help Starmer and Reeves out with their very foolish & nasty attack on pensioners fuel allowance. Just the increase into the state pension for the winter months. That way some will pay no tax, some 20% some 40% and some 45% (the tax allowances are frozen anyway by socialist Hunt) and so it is fairer that way and far cheaper to administer.
Then fire the mad, Net Zero Zealot Ed Miliband and ditch the evil (& totally unscientific) net zero ārenewablesā agenda. It is economic and scientific insanity.
September 10, 2024
@Lifelogic – to logical. Our current political class desperately need to force people to be beholden by having to ask, no pleed for help. Pensioners are those that are proud, feel the need to self-reliant. The will go without, suffer before reaching for begging bowl, the don’t feel they are entitled further than having paid into a club (NHI) so a return on that investment is an expectation. My understanding is the last administration ( calling themselves conservatives ) severed the link and turned NHI into a benefit, through an act of parliament.
September 10, 2024
It seems the State pension might rise next spring by Ā£450 for some, less for others. The ones feeling the cold will already have shivered. So, income Ā£300 down leaving perhaps Ā£150 which may well be subject to income tax anyway.
Rachel Reeves is a cold hearted highway robber without the mask. Behind the smile lies a deep ill-intent.
September 10, 2024
Iād love to see a poll of all Conservative Party members asking:
Do you approve of the last governmentās high immigration?
Do you think the last government should have physically stopped the boats?
Do you approve of the last governmentās high taxation?
I believe a very high percentage of members would answer No, Yes, No.
I believe a very high percentage of current Tory MPs would answer Yes, No, Yes.
September 10, 2024
They did not even try to stop the boats or even restrict legal immigration much. You could also add “do you think we should head over the economic cliff with May Net Zero insanity and intermittent rip of energy at 3+ times the price of the USA – some of the most expensive in the World.
Do you think we should waste Ā£billions on hotels for illegal immigrants, HS2, road blocking, worthless degrees, net harm Covid vaccines. net harm lockdowns, PPE supply corruption, hate crimes, suppressing free speech…?
September 10, 2024
Alas I wouldnāt ask your Net Zero question because most people, including Conservative Party members have bought the nonsense hook, line and sinker.
September 11, 2024
Mike,
1. No
2. Yes
3. If you think the last government’s tax was high, you haven’t seen anything yet!
September 10, 2024
Tend to agree. Starmer has four years to manufacture crises while ignoring other inconvenient crises and then invoke “novel” solutions to solve them.
Far right riots and the Ā£22bn black hole are but the first in a series. Gouge enormous amounts of tax out of strivers and users of private services, deprive all but his client class of any state support. Use that cash to prop up monopoly state enterprises and their co passengers.
September 10, 2024
The Conservatives were amateurs in this game because they were trying to face both ways. The true faces are Labour for the left and Reform for the right.
September 10, 2024
Hi sir John
Let’s have a conservative leader that hasn’t got their hearts in another country
Let’s ha e a true British person
September 10, 2024
Lets have an MP of any colour who hasn’t got a heart in another country. Seems that way.
September 10, 2024
Welcome to Marxism and the Great Reset. It can only be achieved by full on destruction this 20% of electorate supported Government is primed and ready to get on with it (full on Marxism) and get away with it. All because the faux Conservatives under Cameron, May, Johnson and Sunak refused to listen, lied to get elected reneged on everything conservatism wanted to be left wing one nation WEF Socialists. Do you get my drift?
Starmer was brought up on us by the shower of pretend conservatives that wish even today to have more of their failed continuity foisted up on us. They havenāt listened and even after giving away an 80-seat majority they want this failure to return.
September 11, 2024
Agreed. I think the reason Sunak went early is because the WEF knew the Not-a-Conservative-Party was going to lose and they wanted to scupper Reform’s chances before it had a real chance to organise and without Farage (or with him distracted by the Presidential election). So the Treacherous Tories would lose, but not too badly and the Uni-Party would be maintained.
They miscalculated: Farage led the fight; the NaCP has been obliterated and Reform is now a serious challenge.
I wouldn’t be in the least bit surprised to find out that Blair and Mandelson were advising Sunak, as well as Starmer.
September 10, 2024
Labour usually gain office with plenty of money to spend after a long stint of Conservative Govt has cleared up the previous Labour waste and mess; but after the voters respond to a Tory scandal or just seek change for changeās sake.
This time, it is as if Labour is starting office with the vast loss of money it usually creates itself. Even so, New-Broom Starmer handles things the wrong way around: holding the bristles and trying to sweep up with the tip of the pole. In the process, heās prodding the wrong people painfully, and building even more mess with crazy policies. Trigger had a more sensible approach for renewal.
September 10, 2024
The fact is no one should be surprised
In the absence of any real or effective policies this man who could never be described as visionary is floundering
September 10, 2024
Starmer shows how unsuitable he is to be PM and how poor this Labour Government will be. The basic requirement for a PM is that he or she is proud of the UK, not whingeing that everything about it is wrong because the conservative government messed everything up.
He is a second-rate PM with a second-rate team of Ministers around him. Why are they all so miserable and depressing? I wonder if this government will last for four-plus years. Conservatives / Reform have every reason to believe they can succeed at the next GE with exemplary leadership.
Trade Union demands and public anger will blow Labour apart faster than expected!
September 10, 2024
Heās nowhere near second rate! If he were the prospects would look much brighter.
September 10, 2024
First of all, nobody believes that they suddenly found this alleged black hole. It is clear they are making it up or cooking the books to justify their abuse of the British public.
You will always find that a psychopath attempts to justify his actions by making irrational claims against his victims. “Look at how they have harmed the economy by spending so freely,” Starmer might say. Or, “See how they use up so many resources just to be comfortable and resist windmills,” Miliband might have said.
The last government had a reputation for not being believed. This one has no chance of ever getting the public on their side because the reality they want to impose on us is so very far from what we need and want. Never mind their deceptions.
Forget for a moment that the insanity of netzero that will be pushed down our throats until we choke. The instincts of socialists is to deceive, to get their way, and to destroy anything that was good or worked well. With potentially 10 years to create havoc, the Starmer government has plenty of time to complete his planned extirpation!
September 10, 2024
Whilst I think the Ā£22 billion black hole is tosh, I canāt see what Labour stand to gain by beating us all up – which they have (to a fairly serious extent) with the scrapping of the WFA and will when fuel duty goes up.
September 10, 2024
“The latest polls show Labour down to 30%. They show Reform and the Conservatives together well ahead ….”
History has shown us that the only reliable poll is the one on election day.
As a former Conservative Party member I am hoping that the current “Conservative” Party is put out of its misery.
September 10, 2024
+1
September 10, 2024
āThey [the polls] show Reform and the Conservatives together well ahead [of Labour], but also the big split between the two would still leave both individually trailing Labour.ā
Itās a false view to see a Conservative and Reform āsplitā in opposition to Labour.
The Conservative MPs with their main policies of mass immigration (legal and illegal) and Net Zero are no opposition to Labour (or the Lib Dems or even the Greens). A closer relationship with, if not actually a return to membership of the EU can also be included.
Only Reform can be considered to be acting as an opposition to the current ruling party. Itās bizarre to have an opposition so in tune with the governmentās policies.
September 10, 2024
The prime minister’s approach will work a treat of course if in circa two years time he can truthfully tell us how well the country and all that is in it is doing whilst reminding us of the dark inheritance he has overcome.
Mr. Starmer’s prospects look bleak though, with poor policies, supporters expecting more than can be provided, and an inexperienced and largely talent-free team. International politics and economics are unlikely to help, particularly if the U.S. economy is now in recession.
September 10, 2024
Amidst the gloom, we are told taxes must rise to fund the N.H.S..
You have pointed out hitherto that the N.H.S. has seen plenty of extra funding in the recent past, in excess of inflation. That has not made the difference that it should have.
This topic is surely an open goal for the official Opposition so why the timidity in making it?
September 10, 2024
āConservatives still lead Reform.ā
For how long? Reform may be small but they have a group of very intelligent MPs who will be shown to be the real opposition to this diabolical Government if they get the chance to speak in the House. Zia the Chairman is inspirational and would make a fantastic Prime Minister. Reform now has 4 years to build a grassroots army which they are quietly doing. I believe they are the only party with the vision to turn this country around. Sir John should put country before party and volunteer his great mind to their cause to save us all. The Conservatives have failed to learn the lesson voters gave them. They are full of lefty liberals. Why would any true conservative vote for them now or in the future?
Reply I offer all the free advice to anyone interested and am happy to talk to people who want further explanation.
September 10, 2024
reply to reply ….thats the problem for you, us out here are not interested, we’ve seen enough.
September 10, 2024
The polls count for nothing with Starmer – he’s on a mission to straighten out the country and has some years to run so he is not interested in playing the short term populism game.
September 10, 2024
This makes sense once we realise Trot lawyer Starmer and his far left Stasiettes are globalist WEF/UN agenda followers who aim to make the private citizen poor but happy and dependent on the State. Those of us who have savings and investments which are not state origin will be deprived of wealth and raised CGT, IHT, property taxes and council tax will be the means to break us. The one percent described by Stiglitz will of course increase their wealth as they are WEF members and Starmer prefers to deal with them instead of noisy Westminster opposition.
September 11, 2024
Correct.
They intend to “Build Back Better,” rather like Lenin did.
Which first means destroying everything, rather like Lenin did.
And so did the Not-a-Conservative-Government.
September 11, 2024
Actually electricity generation in the Russian Empire/Soviet Union went from 1.9bn KWh in 1913 to 8.8bn KWh (Lenin’s target under 1920’s GOECRO) in 1931 to 13.5bn KWh by end 1932 to 36bnKWh in 1937 and 48 bn KWh in 1940.
“Economic Transformation of the Soviet Union 1913-1945” ,Cambridge Press, is a good,if rather dry,academic source of FACTS on the USSR.
September 10, 2024
The Conservative party has always defended FPTP voting on the grounds that it delivers strong government. Well, It has got that in spades. There is now a strong case for reform of the voting system so that the number of seats won by each party bears a reasonably close relationship to its share of the vote. Voters don’t even have a mechanism to get rid of an appalling government. Labour’s massive majority means that Parliament is very unlikely ever to be able to pass a vote of no confidence. On a 37% share of the vote! It is mere convention that we have general elections approximately every five years. If Labour wish to stay in power longer they can – six years or ten? Why not 15 years? It is clearly a socialist authoritarian intolerant government. It is clamping down hard on free speech. UK is one step away from becoming a one-party state. To whom can the public turn? The King? The King’s Armed Forces? No-one. Eventually there will be more rioting and violence.
Reply They only got 34%. They do have to hold an election within 5 years. If we had PR normally no party would win, every party wanting to be in government would dump their Manifesto promises and some would stitch up a deal which the electorate. Ishtar hate. How is that better? See Germany today
September 10, 2024
Reply to reply – Manifesto promises mean nothing under the present system. At least with PR one would have the belief that oneās vote might count a little bit.
September 10, 2024
The reverse. No manifesto survives a PR election.
September 10, 2024
I think the truth is Starmer is no good as a politician and neither is he much good at running the country. He was lucky he was up against Sunak in the election as Sunak was discredited by his period in office as well as being a useless politician as I don’t believe he would have been running a majority government and maybe any government if the Conservatives hadn’t foolishly ousted Boris Johnson.
Taking the winter fuel payment away from ten million pensioners is idiotically bad politics, especially as there are hundreds of other ways he could have raised that relatively small amount of money without such damaging political repercussions. He could for example have reduced foreign aid to 0.4% of GDP which would have raised more or he could have reduced subsidies to the railways by a mere 5%!
Of the Conservative contenders for the leadership the only one who seems to be even halfway to being a skilled politician (though no match for Nigel Farage) is Robert Jenrick though I don’t trust him one bit and I doubt his brainpower for a top job.
September 10, 2024
GB : āTaking the winter fuel payment away from ten million pensioners is idiotically bad politics, especially as there are hundreds of other ways he could have raised that relatively small amount of money without such damaging political repercussions.ā
I donāt think it was a money-saving measure. I think it was a Net Zero CO2 emissions saving measure.
September 11, 2024
if all the people eligible for financial help take it up, the cost will be more than the Ā£1.5bn squeezed proposed.
So much for addressing the ‘black hole’.
Do all the Lords taking their daily Ā£300 reflect on the Scrooge Labour Party?
September 10, 2024
@Geoffrey Berg – those that have put themselves forward in the leadership contest have a big impediment in common, as part of the previous cabinet they shared responseability for all decisions made. Including throwing away and 80 seat majority.
September 10, 2024
I agree with almost everything you say, Geoffrey, except that it might be difficult to get a majority with Our Nige’ as leader. I would certainly vote for him, but sadly, he is seen by many people as such a Marmite figure. Perhaps the candidate for PM should be Richard Tice ? It can’t be a Conservative, because none of the 4.1m who voted Reform on 4th july, and many more (including me), wouldn’t trust any of them, except, perhaps, Suella.
September 11, 2024
Chris, Farage campaigned for Brexit but no says nothing about what is good that has come out of it.
I certainly wouldn’t vote for him, he’s a waste of space if he can’t reel off at least twenty advantages from the action the UK took. People feel very let down by him. Yes, some of this fans ra ra ra at the pub with him about stopping the boats (do you really think officialdom, the courts and the UN would allow him to do any differently than they let the Tories to do!), but why aren’t any of them asking him about changes that are in place to save the UK money, protect us from bad debt in the EU, save us billions in student loans to EU students that most aren’t repaying.
September 10, 2024
Far left government with show trials.
September 10, 2024
I think the reason is BREXIT. The Prime Minister sees nothing good about the country since we left the EU, regardless of evidence to the contrary.
The elderly are blamed for BREXIT and now itās payback time!
He has absolutely no idea about government without orders from the EU which is why he is running around Europe desperately trying to āresetā relationships. Clearly the hope is that the new relationship will put us back under EU control to save the government the effort of thinking for themselves.
September 10, 2024
@RichardP – 2TK has publicly declared that it is WEF he is guided by, as he finds a democratically elected chamber is not his choice to follow
September 10, 2024
The Conservative Party would do well to take a pragmatic approach at the next general election and not put up candidates in constituencies where Reform stand a chance of taking the seat from Labour.
The priority must be to get rid of Labour.
The egregious behaviour of the last Conservative government and parliamentary party will keep them from gaining a majority for years to come. I cannot see Reform making a formal pact with the bunch of losers we have now, so if the Conservative Party loves our country the must do what has to be done.
September 10, 2024
I think you will find that what passes for the āConservative partyā does not love our country. The division is not between parties but between the political class and the people.
September 10, 2024
The outcome of the election is devastating ; it is entirely due to bad timing decision of the Sunak/Hunt relationship . If they had waited until January and a BoE rate cut , things would have been different and the present suffering avoided .
September 10, 2024
B+Y :
PM Sunak called the GE early to make sure it was before the Rwanda plan could be tested safe in the knowledge that the following administration would cancel it. He was afraid it might actually work.
September 10, 2024
Starmer clearly has no idea how to run the country, he is even making Sunak look good !
Polling is going to get very much worse for Labour, especially if they increase fuel duty and Inheritance tax, which is surprisingly unpopular, even amongst those whose families will never have to pay it. Labour has never understood aspiration.
Today’s announcement or major job losses in steel-making will inevitably lead to higher imports, and the growing crisis in the car industry posed by the over-ambitious and forced switch to EVs, and we can see storm clouds rapidly forming. Add in a switch to road pricing, which is an inevitable consequences of EVs, and a plan being floated to change council tax bands and we have a recipe for a disastrous outcome for this government.
Almost nobody doubts that any changes Labour makes to taxation will take much more money from middle England and most of the revenue raised will be wasted on things we don’t want or need : Net Zero, for example.
I can see Starmer in real trouble within the first two years of his government. Reform and the Conservatives really must get talking, as together they will have a real chance to displace Labour, possibly even before 2029.
September 11, 2024
There is plenty online, from the Intergenerational Foundation through to The Times declaring that 25% of over 65s are millionaires. So that’s a lot of people expecting to be in the inheritance tax categories, plus the people who are alone who only have to be half millionaires to pay inheritance tax over Ā£500,000 if they have children, or Ā£325,000 if they don’t. Ripe for the picking.
September 10, 2024
Is it possible that Sir Keir is a bit thick?
September 10, 2024
Theyāre all a bit thick. Grinning jackanapes most of them. Snouts in the trough- trebles all round.
September 10, 2024
Yes, we would much prefer to be lied to. “We will reduce immigration to the tens of thousands. Our warmongering is vital to save Western civilisation from the alien hordes in the East. We need to lock down the country to prevent hundreds of thousands of deaths from a deadly new disease from which we will then protect you with a safe and effective vaccine with emergency authorisation for which the vaccine manufacturers will be given blanket legal indemnity. Carbon dioxide is the biggest threat facing civilisation which would cause runaway global warming so all our power generation must be based on intermittent ‘free’ energy whilst the Chinese and Indians continue to build coal-fired power stations. We must ‘rewild’ our farmland to ‘trap’ carbon dioxide. The loss of our industrial base as a result of the cost of ‘free’ energy is a small price to pay for saving the planet as we can buy all the stuff we need from the Chinese whose carbon dioxide output is not harmful. Working from home is as productive as working in an office.
September 10, 2024
The electorate loves lies, the sweeter the better. Yes we can indulge ourselves, because we can pass the cost onto the next generation. How kind.
September 10, 2024
In all honesty I donāt see anything different between Labour & Conservative
September 10, 2024
“A bizarre way to run a government” I couldn’t agree more, but the previous administration with their 80-seat majority opened the door. Even now with the purgatory, the prejudice and terrorist diabolical actions that seem to be bubbling up daily from these numpties on the back off just 20% of the support from the electorate are destined to get away with it. The last administration made it possible
It appears Labour will ramp up taxation at the expense of the economy. They appear to have gotten away with locking up dissenters as right-wing terrorists, so expect more. They will hit all those that ātheyā think are not their natural supporters, punish those they wish were dead as they are burdensome.
But as there is no opposition, no one with the ability to keep them in check they will keep doing what is needed for them to remain as rulers into the next millennium. The faux crowd in the parliamentary grouping ‘the more of the same continuity unit’ still donāt see they are the ones that brought this on everyone. The have opened the door to the proposition that should a conservative ever find their way through the doors at the Palace of Westminster they will be arrested and locked up as extremist and terrorist. The former Director of Public Prosecutions and head of the Crown Prosecution Service knows āfree speechā and democracy is his enemy that is why in the few days in power he has focused on removing it from the UK.
Thank-you, Cameron, May, Johnson and Sunak, the Conservative Parliamentary Group, CCHQ the 1922 Committee this destruction is on your āheadsā You only had to be Conservative, not Socialist WEF Muppets(sorry Kermit).
September 10, 2024
This so-called Labour government will be the death of Britishness if they continue to follow the current path they have taken. They are a disgrace to us, British citizens and a joke to the rest of the world. Alarmingly, they are proving to be a very costly joke for us, though. When will we be rid of them?
September 10, 2024
Derek
The tragedy is, they think it is they that will still be in charge in 20-30 years time. I have news for them. You won’t !
September 10, 2024
About the winter fuel allowance, which we learn because of Boris’s overall betrayal will be paid anyway to U.K. citizens living in the Evil Empire, are there no grounds for seeking an injunction at the hitherto very obliging Court of Session to halt the government’s plans for us? U.K. citizens within the U.K. outrageously discrinimated against surely infringes our human rights somehow, no?
I accept winning an injunction makes the U.K. ungovernable but better no government than a bad government.
September 10, 2024
O/T It would be welcome were you minded to write about Mr. Draghi’s recent report on “The future of European competitiveness” that seems to echo the topics you have discussed hitherto.
As you have doubtless seen, he calls for new spending of ā¬800 million to stave off decline, suggesting otherwise choices will be forced between security, environmental (green) initiatives and social programmes.
Lack of investment and innovation seem to trouble him and he points to the lead enjoyed by the U.S.A. in G.D.P..
September 10, 2024
With all the doom and gloom would you invest in uk
September 11, 2024
the smart have already moved assets and cash investments out.
September 10, 2024
Now that Tories in doldrums be great to see a revival of Edmund Burke. Great man who was pro Christian, pro monarchy, pro arts, pro property – anti French Revolution, anti slavery, anti opium trade. And popular with both Conservatives and liberals and willing to risk losing popularity over (even though a Protestant and a unionist) his pro Catholic emancipation stance (losing his seat over this) and anti French Revolution stance.
September 10, 2024
We are now at the stage where a vote for a Tory means a Labour government. Only a vote for Reform van get Labour out.
September 10, 2024
They seem to dislike the country and many of its inhabitants. They have this in common with Biden administration. Both countries seem keen to transform the demographics of the voter base as quickly as possible.
September 10, 2024
Starma Drama!
First scare the hell out of pensioners and families then show how powerful you appear to be by offering a debate while meantime illegal immigration goes unchecked and the real black hole created by New Labour’s legacy splashing the cash with long term interest is forgotten.
Dress like an undertaker, suits new glasses and new makeover image provided by Labour’s donors. Sterilized and pasteurized a cardboard cut out PM.
Halloween rehearsal for the Big One – Bumper Budget.
September 11, 2024
Thanks for the many great articles and comments here – going to stop.
I’m thinking about trying to become a Tory MP.
Although there are about a million people more qualified than me, none of these million are going for the job so why not have a go?
I have less than a 1% to 3 % chance but who knows.