What's this about Count Binface being the only challenger to Farage?
Surely when faced with a 1v1 against a joke of a person Binface is in with a shout.
Surely when faced with a 1v1 against a joke of a person Binface is in with a shout.
Westminster Politics 2024-2029
- Thread starter Pexbo
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He won't be. There are a bunch of independents who will stand, including a couple of neo Nazis.
He just will be the only 'viable' challenger.
If I was a Reform strategist, I'd be chucking money at anyone and everyone to run as independents in that election. A straight shoot out between Farage and the comedy candidate is such a big risk for them.
anything even close to double digit % for Binface will make it a laughing stock for Reform. His highest return in any election was 1%
He's right about Miliband. The public dont like him and he'd be a dangerous chancellor. In an ideal world i would love it if we could have somebody with some actual relevant experience of economics but at least Mahmood has had a job.
Burnham's future will depend on a stable, competent cabinet. He needs to clear out the ideologues and the idiots like Miliband and Philipson.
If not liking Miliband is grounds for Mahmood to get it, i'm even more concerned.
I'd probably prefer Miliband to stay with climate policy anyway, but Mahmood is political poison from everything i've been reading/listening to.If the public don't like Miliband, where are the public who do like Mahmood? I've not come across them.
It's not a case of anyone liking Mahmood, its clearly a choice to appease the right wing of the party and the media.
Which, for me, isn't a case of falling at the first hurdle. He's decided to stop at the first hurdle, set up a picnic there and attempt to eat it.
Some will argue It's a sensible political decision. I'd argue he's doing the same shit the last guy did.
Yes, but Andy will smile, jest and maybe even 'sing and dance' his way around such issues, at least a large percentage of the PLP hope/pray he will.... but of course the decisions will still be the same dilemmas and present the same possibilities.
The one thing that caught my eye today was the leader of the lords reportedly commenting on the possibility of 'constitutional carnage' if reported changes to the second chamber are enacted
If Andy is serious about changes in constitutional law, then Labour might just 'move the dial' after all; even if its twenty years away!
The latest Lords Reform is a retirement age of 85 reduced to 80 over time, and a rule that if you don't turn up and contribute you lose your seat.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c79y902nje5o
If Burnham can manage the legislative process well this should be enacted easily. If opponents are calling these measures carnage, goodness only know what they think about an elected chamber.
If not liking Miliband is grounds for Mahmood to get it, i'm even more concerned.
Her being viewed positively shows how bad Miliband is. Markets have responded well to the rumours anyway, though mostly because its anybody but him.
The public don't matter, haven't to the Labour right wing for a long time. The rich media owners like Mahmood and not Milliband because he's not racist and he once got called "Red Ed". Imagine the nerve of the man!
These are 'foot in the door' issues; what the Lords is and what it does is the real issue.
Like many Labour PM's before him, Andy will no doubt wish to mount a full scale remodelling of the Lords, but 'events' ( real and imagined) will confine, interfere and finally reduce this wish to one of simply 'chipping a way at the edges'.
Tony Benn's idea to create a 1000 new Lords to vote them out of existence, is still as far away as it ever was.
Obtaining constitutional change, in a unwritten process, based on precedent, requires a legal insider view and knowledge.
Labour has just 'dumped' such a person who might have had an answer, and have been in the position to effect such change.
"As you were folks....nothing to see here!"
Yeah Starmer was doing such a good job of getting rid of the House of Lords. And his legal insider mate Lammy of course. Both of whom are still bloody Labour MPs. Fact is they didn't want to change things and may or may not want to even help the Labour party once they've been punted.
Yes, in someways making more progress than any other previous Labour PM.
Let's hope Andy can continue; it has taken hundreds (some might say thousands) of years to establish the power of the Lords, it won't be dissipated in one or even two parliamentary terms, especially as it will not be seen as anywhere near a priority for Labour, and certainly not by the Tory party.
The Lords has tremendous (often latent/ soft) powers and like the 'Iceberg' these are often two thirds below the water line. This power is often presented to the public as just being 'illusionary' not understandable by the average person, and it is true what you dont understand is difficult to deal with, and it gets continuely 'kicked into the long grass' just because of this belief it is considerd 'illusionary'.
Starmer was the one person who might have been able to identify and change things, unfortunately his personality did not do him any favours.
Starmer is now probably in the position that seeing as his own party turned on him...the "Prophet in his own land"...etc. he will think I can't defeat the Barons so may as well join them and wait for his call to join their Lordships as a life Peer.
And who could blame him?
..
What exactly has he achieved? There's been 141 new peers added in his short tenure. Those who did have their hereditary powers removed quickly just got life peerages.
Despite explicitly saying to Sunak in parliament that he wouldn't do a Boris, he's thrown his morals in the bin and done exactly the same thing on his way out. As far as I recall no other Labour leader has ever done resignation lists.
He just appointed 26 new Lords, you're off your trolley with this Starmer (lack of?) personality cult thing you've got going on.
Hereditary peerages have been abolished, right?
So without constant refilling it would hypothetically die out?
So without constant refilling it would hypothetically die out?
They were already effectively abolished in 99. No hereditary peer has passed down their title to family since 1999 they lost that right. The seat might still exist but it goes to a vote.
All he's done really is ensured the role is renamed in time. A life peers seat might disappear when they die but if they keep giving out vast peerages like Starmer has done then what is achieved?
First 'tranche' of the 1000 new ones Tony Benn called to vote themselves out of existence?
But there's no such plan and there's no chance Starmer was ever going to do that. He did what all the Tory MPs do, use it to build support and for his own political means.
They talk abolishment because it polls well that's it. The fact Starmer did such a minor no impact change demonstrates that quite clearly. It's false progress.
It's not about abolishment, as such.... it's about the change of the basis of the law making process that underpins our unwritten constituent, most of it is based on precedent. When much of constitutional law is based on what has gone before they are focused or directed or inclined to follow the needs of those who first made such laws... i.e mostly land owning Barons etc.
On an island... those who 'own' the land, who have constitutional rights over its sale, uses, charges for and about land held in perpetuity, etc. hold what is often referred to as 'soft power', is vitally important to every ones future that bodies (Houses of Commons and Lords) which represent ''the will of the people' are not usurped by the workings of such 'soft power'.
There were clues to the fact that Starmer accepted that legal changes needed to be made, especially over land rights, etc.but he also recognised this would not be settled over night, or even perhaps in a decade, or two. However, the need to begin the process of 'real change' for the future had to be started and the small changes that you are referring too are only the beginning, of the softly softly steps (ie. 'don't frighten the horses') needed.
Starmers legal background made him the ideal standard bearer to take these things through, especially in the position of PM; however his lack of political nous, made him look and act like a 'knock about' figure and those that opposed him and those who were supposed to be supporting him, all took advantage, (as the political process is inclined to allow the 'mob' )to target decent and honorable individuals.
More Labour Together vermin. Burnham the smarmy cnut.
This won't stop the right wing narrative that London is more a crime-riddled no-go area, but interesting new crime figures nonetheless. The folk in the comment section aren't buying it.
https://www.thetimes.com/uk/london/article/phones-thefts-down-half-london-7rfvt38pp
Great to see two of the best pals light heartedly joshing on prime time. Laugh as if Epstein wan't a prolific child rapist.
I wouldnt be singing from the rooftops yet. Its about time something dropped as petty theft has been rising rapidly for years, and shoplifting still is.
I'm not, but it's fair to point out positive news, rather than focusing purely on the negatives. I'm enjoying still being in Asia where I can leave my front door unlocked or my laptop on a cafe table while I order at the counter and not get robbed.I wonder why.
It's a real head scratcher, isn't it?
UK's iconic Jodrell Bank telescope faces axe in science cuts
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5y6r9rdxygo
All that wasted money elsewhere but oh no, the telescope is a bridge too far. One of the few areas in which the UK is truly world-leading too.
It's amazing that the UKRI can't find £2.8m for this but can give £96m to Edinburgh University for computing and AI research. A university that just got £750m from the UK government for the same thing. A university that has a £1Bn property portfolio who then claimed poverty and demanded more money from the Scottish Funding Council because they said they were going to make a loss after buying a bunch of houses to make rent from.
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They are acting under government direction to improve economic growth to be fair to them. And the government thinks AI creates more jobs than space telescopes.
Still, we are talking about less than £3m out of a total funding allocation of £30bn.
Reform UK reporting Green leader Zack Polanski to police over Instagram post
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y063yqlleo
The thing that makes jobs obsolete and gobbles up half our energy will be good for jobs? If love to know how they reached this conclusion.
After all the crying they do over 'arrests for tweets'..
Feck me, modern politicians (and Im generously including Polanski in that even though he’s not even an elected MP) are pathetic.
Tbf they're fecking idiots then. The idea that £3m of AI hype funding will generate more jobs than losing Jodrell Bank will cost is for the fairies.
Asked about Israel's war crimes, Streeting bangs on about Israel's "right to do that" but that Israel has "fallen short of what we expect" and suggests the real issue is not the Palestinian suffering at the brutal hands of Israel but that the war crimes are making Israeli's less safe. Streeting gave a "she had it coming dressed like that" argument for why Israel slaughtered tens of thousands of children.
10 days in and Burnham has gone silent. All they've done so far is say "I'm sowwy, we got it wrong" and feck all else except the mass arrest of protesters. Burnham is a continuation of the racist Starmer policies.
It'll be three years of Burnham trying to prove that he loves Israel more than Starmer did, before handing off to Farage.