Snap General Election called - The new UK Politics thread

[Son of Mathonwy]

https://anotherangryvoice.substack.com/ ... t-the-only

The video that's in the middle of this is really something. Prime Minister Starmer with his slow, deliberate calculated speaking style, peppered with dramatic pauses as he says, "If we do need to do more to reduce the pressures on public services, on benefits, on housing [by reducing migration], then mark my works - we will." And then the other half of the screen starts playing, showing Labour leader candidate Starmer from 2020, open collar and no tie, animation in his voice, talking with his hands and moving about as he says, "Low wages, poor housing, poor social services are not the fault of migrants; they're political failure. Political. Failure."

Utterly horrifying that the leader of our country is someone with so few convictions and so little character that he can leap from one persona to another without even the slightest sign that he realises it's a bad thing. Frankly, it's verging on sociopathic.

Puja

Good link.

Everyone should see this although it comes as no surprise to the Labour party members he duped in 2020 that he's a conscience-deficient drone, seeking power for its own sake. Sociopath, psychopath, who knows, he has that characteristic void where his empathy should be.

I wonder which it is he believes about immigration, the 2020 or 2025 version? Or maybe he doesn't even have an opinion, merely speaking the words he thinks will most advantage himself from minute to minute, like chatgpt trained on the collected utterances of Tony Blair. Tony Blair without the charm.

A dangerous man who should never have risen to the top. He won't get another term but will most likely be replaced by an even more dangerous man.

(NB my god, has he aged in 5 years. Looks like 10, 15 years.)

[Son of Mathonwy]

More soft power being torched for negligible budget savings:

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/ ... et-slashed

[Mellsblue]

The failure was wider than just the police. As the inquiry has already demonstrated. And the concern at upsetting a minority group was one of the reasons why that failure occurred. Again, as per the finding of that original inquiry.

As per my previous post, the anger surrounding this would not be there as much to be exploited if the police and other agencies had done their job without fear or favour.

failures of policing
police's failure
Puja

Policing and social services and senior council officers and councillors.

Thought the grooming stuff had its own thread but as it doesn’t:

Andrew Norfolk obituary: Times reporter who exposed grooming gangs
https://www.thetimes.com/article/828cb2 ... 55bcea95f7

Don’t mind admitting that reading this brought a tear to my eye.

[Sandydragon]

You can have a discussion about immigration numbers without the emotion, and I think Starmer made a mistake with some of his language. As many have said before, don’t try and ape Farage, he will just become more extreme and dare you to keep up.

Starmer can’t ignore immigration. Unfortunately he seems keen to avoid a discussion on Brexit which caused the small boat issue n the first place. It’s also clear that without immigrants, large parts of our economy will be screwed. Will the masses ranks of the UKs unemployed suddenly decide to wipe up after people in care for minimum wage? Somehow I doubt it. So care costs will go through the roof and someone will have to pay.

But in my view the damage Brexit caused just becomes more apparent by the day, and it’s time to have a proper conversation about where it’s left us and what we do next.

Brexit, exactly. Unless I'm totally misunderstanding the situation, that's the reason why the immigration figures shot up under Johnson* - EU workers went home and had to be replaced. But instead of temporary EU visitors that meant permanent migrants (mostly from India and Nigeria, just to empower the far right even more). But Starmer is terrified of Brexit so can't even renegotiate Johnson's awful deal. Brexit has turboboosted immigration - the perfect result for Farage.

*Which may have seemed like a good idea at the time, since Farage had disappeared, dispelled by Brexit success and another populist, bullshitting leader.

It's austerity more than Brexit. The slashing and burning of budgets meant that wages stagnated and training opportunities vanished, leaving whole sectors reliant on Poles/Romanians/Bulgarians who could be imported en masse to do jobs at a lower wage than British people (and, in the case of nursing, often having trained abroad so we didn't have to pay for that either). We got ourselves into a shitty economic system where our economy was entirely reliant on importing cheap overseas labour, which was a problem even before we decided the best thing to do was to abruptly cut off the source of the cheap overseas labour that we depended on, for unrelated political reasons.

Even if we rejoined the EU tomorrow, it wouldn't be fixing the actual problem - just reinstalling the better workaround.

Puja

Disagree. There were plenty of eU workers under the Blair and Briwn governments. If you want to look at that issue then it would be Blair signing up to free movement that opened that up.

If austerity reduced budgets the there would have been less need for builders of any nationality.

[Puja]

Brexit, exactly. Unless I'm totally misunderstanding the situation, that's the reason why the immigration figures shot up under Johnson* - EU workers went home and had to be replaced. But instead of temporary EU visitors that meant permanent migrants (mostly from India and Nigeria, just to empower the far right even more). But Starmer is terrified of Brexit so can't even renegotiate Johnson's awful deal. Brexit has turboboosted immigration - the perfect result for Farage.

*Which may have seemed like a good idea at the time, since Farage had disappeared, dispelled by Brexit success and another populist, bullshitting leader.

It's austerity more than Brexit. The slashing and burning of budgets meant that wages stagnated and training opportunities vanished, leaving whole sectors reliant on Poles/Romanians/Bulgarians who could be imported en masse to do jobs at a lower wage than British people (and, in the case of nursing, often having trained abroad so we didn't have to pay for that either). We got ourselves into a shitty economic system where our economy was entirely reliant on importing cheap overseas labour, which was a problem even before we decided the best thing to do was to abruptly cut off the source of the cheap overseas labour that we depended on, for unrelated political reasons.

Even if we rejoined the EU tomorrow, it wouldn't be fixing the actual problem - just reinstalling the better workaround.

Puja

Disagree. There were plenty of eU workers under the Blair and Briwn governments. If you want to look at that issue then it would be Blair signing up to free movement that opened that up.

If austerity reduced budgets the there would have been less need for builders of any nationality.

Fair point - I was thinking care and also nursing/medicine and the supercharging that got from austerity and tuition fees, but you are quite right that Britain's addiction to cheap labour started far earlier. Successive governments not only ignored the problem, but made it far worse over time.

Puja

[Which Tyler]

Reform are already talking about a UK DOGE effect. Let’s see how well that goes down when local services collapse. I don’t think sacking DEI officers will be that noticeable, but widespread slash and burn will.

After successfully firing all the DEI officers in Lincolnshire, by... realising that there weren't any to start with; Reform have racked up their second win by scrapping Low Traffic Neighbourhoods in Reform-led councils... that also didn't exist to start with.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... none-exist

[Son of Mathonwy]

Reform are already talking about a UK DOGE effect. Let’s see how well that goes down when local services collapse. I don’t think sacking DEI officers will be that noticeable, but widespread slash and burn will.

After successfully firing all the DEI officers in Lincolnshire, by... realising that there weren't any to start with; Reform have racked up their second win by scrapping Low Traffic Neighbourhoods in Reform-led councils... that also didn't exist to start with.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... none-exist

It almost makes you think that Reform are full of shit.

Still, what do they care, it got them elected. Invent a cause for all our problems and campaign against it. Doesn't matter if it really is the cause, or if it even exists.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Holy crap, I haven't looked at this for a while:. Not good:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_p ... l_election

Starmer ought to resign after a historically bad first 10 months. But not as fast as Badenoch, who is steering the good ship Tory to the bottom of the ocean. Farage doesn't need to do anything, Keir and Kemi are doing everything he wants.

[Which Tyler]

Brexiters: The point of Brexit is to allow Britain to make our own trade deals
Also Brexiters: Negotiating our own trade deal with our biggest trade partner is a complete betrayal of Brexit

[Son of Mathonwy]

Brexiters: The point of Brexit is to allow Britain to make our own trade deals
Also Brexiters: Negotiating our own trade deal with our biggest trade partner is a complete betrayal of Brexit

Nice. Brexiters have always treated Europeans differently from everyone else in the world. Closer links with Europe bad, with everyone else good.

But then Brexit was only ever a political weapon, extremely useful to Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage, allowing them to overthrow their enemies (respectively, Cameron and the entire Conservative party).

[Puja]

Holy crap, I haven't looked at this for a while:. Not good:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_p ... l_election

Starmer ought to resign after a historically bad first 10 months. But not as fast as Badenoch, who is steering the good ship Tory to the bottom of the ocean. Farage doesn't need to do anything, Keir and Kemi are doing everything he wants.

I suppose Starmer's thinking is that he's got until mid 2029 with relatively unchallenged power to recover things and that, by that point, he'll have achieved growth and can afford to bung some socialist policies to buy back the support of the left (or threaten them with "A vote for anyone else is a vote for Reform). It could work, in theory, but my concerns are that a) he won't achieve growth (14 years of austerity didn't work for the Tories, so why is he still trying to make it happen?), b) he's underestimating just how much he's pissing off the traditional Labour voter and how difficult it's going to be to get those votes back again, c) it's bloody dangerous to give Farage the credibility of being a realistic political force, especially when you yourself have the charisma and likeability of a toilet roll that fallen into the bowl.

The last one is most worrying - populists thrive on credibility and momentum. If he's the funny protest vote, then people will be discouraged because "he can't win, so it's a wasted vote." However, there's a tipping point at which he gains enough coverage and good enough results that people start to think of him as the de facto opponent to Labour and then things all start rolling downhill. Instead of "shy Reform voters" where people think they're scattered individuals who will be viewed as radical and extreme and keep away because of shame or fear of "wasting your vote", it'll become a normalised opposition to the government and, as people hear other people supporting Reform, more and more moderate people will feel comfortable "lending their vote" to Reform, because everyone else is doing it, so it's a reasonable and socially okay option. And then, pretty soon, it'll be the only option if you are against the government, because now it's voting for the Conservatives that's the wasted vote. Labour would have to start responding to his bloviations directly, which then lends him even more credibility, and accelerates the process.

There is obviously the chance that Reform could implode before that comes up, but I don't see it happening. Farage himself is a very competent and capable political operator who has ridden out many storms and, in a Post-Truth and Post-Shame political climate, I can't see him falling apart, no matter the incompetence and scandals of his MPs/councillors. Right now I am horribly reminded of the Democrats who celebrated Trump winning the Republican nomination because his incompetence, unlikeability, and scandals would surely guarantee them 2016.

Puja

[Son of Mathonwy]

Holy crap, I haven't looked at this for a while:. Not good:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_p ... l_election

Starmer ought to resign after a historically bad first 10 months. But not as fast as Badenoch, who is steering the good ship Tory to the bottom of the ocean. Farage doesn't need to do anything, Keir and Kemi are doing everything he wants.

I suppose Starmer's thinking is that he's got until mid 2029 with relatively unchallenged power to recover things and that, by that point, he'll have achieved growth and can afford to bung some socialist policies to buy back the support of the left (or threaten them with "A vote for anyone else is a vote for Reform). It could work, in theory, but my concerns are that a) he won't achieve growth (14 years of austerity didn't work for the Tories, so why is he still trying to make it happen?), b) he's underestimating just how much he's pissing off the traditional Labour voter and how difficult it's going to be to get those votes back again, c) it's bloody dangerous to give Farage the credibility of being a realistic political force, especially when you yourself have the charisma and likeability of a toilet roll that fallen into the bowl.

The last one is most worrying - populists thrive on credibility and momentum. If he's the funny protest vote, then people will be discouraged because "he can't win, so it's a wasted vote." However, there's a tipping point at which he gains enough coverage and good enough results that people start to think of him as the de facto opponent to Labour and then things all start rolling downhill. Instead of "shy Reform voters" where people think they're scattered individuals who will be viewed as radical and extreme and keep away because of shame or fear of "wasting your vote", it'll become a normalised opposition to the government and, as people hear other people supporting Reform, more and more moderate people will feel comfortable "lending their vote" to Reform, because everyone else is doing it, so it's a reasonable and socially okay option. And then, pretty soon, it'll be the only option if you are against the government, because now it's voting for the Conservatives that's the wasted vote. Labour would have to start responding to his bloviations directly, which then lends him even more credibility, and accelerates the process.

There is obviously the chance that Reform could implode before that comes up, but I don't see it happening. Farage himself is a very competent and capable political operator who has ridden out many storms and, in a Post-Truth and Post-Shame political climate, I can't see him falling apart, no matter the incompetence and scandals of his MPs/councillors. Right now I am horribly reminded of the Democrats who celebrated Trump winning the Republican nomination because his incompetence, unlikeability, and scandals would surely guarantee them 2016.

Puja

Starmer is wasting his time chasing the Reform vote. They simply won't vote Labour. The Mail's headline the day after Starmer's Island of strangers speech was 'LABOUR'S TAKING US ALL FOR FOOLS'. It doesn't matter if how Nazi he goes, he'll lose far more votes than he gains because he's running the Labour party, not the Brexit party. If far-right talk isn't working for the Tories, how can it possibly work for Labour?

Reform won't be tested for competence till they actually win the general election. Even if they are a disaster locally or regionally, it won't be reported as such (it won't be reported at all) in most of the press. Farage is competent enough at running a campaign and sniping from the sidelines. That's all he has to do till 2029.

As for Starmer's strategy, it's a bit difficult to get inside his head. I think he's not particularly numerate, so he leaves the economy and tax and most of the important stuff to others (Reeves). He's also politically naive, so he leaves that to others too (McSweeney). What's left? He seems to have been a successful manager (or at least knows how to suck up to the higher-ups to advance himself) but he obviously thinks he gifted with the ability to make the right decisions. Yeah, truth is he was just lucky, and his luck ran out last year.

He lacks charisma, so he's not going to get any free points from the electorate - he actually has to make things happen. Unfortunately if he has any political leanings, they seem to be to the right, hence the people he promotes. Thus, despite austerity being a total failure for 15 years now (14 Tory, 1 Tory-lite), he doesn't have any other answers.

Although there's nothing stopping him from ditching his team and taking a more left-wing path, I seriously doubt that he will (he'd have to do without some big money backers too). More likely, as you say, he'll probably bet everything on something turning up between now and 2029 which will transform him into a winner (like an upturn . . . or a war). And if it doesn't just happen, well I'm sure he won't struggle to find well paid work, so who cares when the NHS gets sold off?

[Which Tyler]

So.... GB"News" have "organised" a nationwide strike in order to shame Labour into calling a general election... somehow.

The strike is taking this place this weekend...
Which is a bank holiday...
And half term...

So hardly anyone is at work anyway
erm...
yeah...

https://archive.is/gcbQa

[Son of Mathonwy]

So.... GB"News" have "organised" a nationwide strike in order to shame Labour into calling a general election... somehow.

The strike is taking this place this weekend...
Which is a bank holiday...
And half term...

So hardly anyone is at work anyway
erm...
yeah...

https://archive.is/gcbQa

I think this reflects GB Bullshit's total lack of understanding of what a strike is.

[Which Tyler]

Me realising I'm accidentally on GBN's strike because I'm off work for the long weekend


Sorry - shamelessly stole from elsewhere

[Puja]

Me realising I'm accidentally on GBN's strike because I'm off work for the long weekend


Sorry - shamelessly stole from elsewhere

If I'd've known, I'd've deliberately logged into work.

Puja

[Sandydragon]

So.... GB"News" have "organised" a nationwide strike in order to shame Labour into calling a general election... somehow.

The strike is taking this place this weekend...
Which is a bank holiday...
And half term...

So hardly anyone is at work anyway
erm...
yeah...

https://archive.is/gcbQa

Absolute comedy gold. No doubt there will be stats earnestly presented tonight showing how effective it’s been.

Worryingly, some people will believe it

[Son of Mathonwy]

Starmer's government:

Less than a year in office, his inner team appears almost solely focused on re-election in lieu of any vision for the country, as if the point of power is simply to keep it rather than do something with it. The result is an administration lurching from one idea to the next, trying out benefit cuts, migrant bashing, then benefit cut U-turns in the hope that something, anything, sticks.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... d-disabled

[paddy no 11]

What happens the next time there is an incident like Liverpool and the police have to acknowledge the perp is black/Muslim is that a message to the far right that it's OK to burn your own city down, terrorise a few minorities

[Sandydragon]

What happens the next time there is an incident like Liverpool and the police have to acknowledge the perp is black/Muslim is that a message to the far right that it's OK to burn your own city down, terrorise a few minorities

That’s a risk. However, given the problems of last summer, the police response was spot on this time around. Killing off the rumours that were beginning to circulate with the truth has worked.

The alternative was more rioting, most likely, and we appear to be short of prison place to lock up the worst of them.

Arguably, the police making an early release would be welcome even if it were a Muslim man who had driven the vehicle. Getting out front in the age of social media means that you can display some integrity and lead the conversation. If subsequently other facts emerge you are more likely to be believed.

[Puja]

What happens the next time there is an incident like Liverpool and the police have to acknowledge the perp is black/Muslim is that a message to the far right that it's OK to burn your own city down, terrorise a few minorities

Oooft. I hadn't considered that side of things. I don't blame the Liverpool police for getting the ethnicity info out there as quickly as possible so that we didn't have Tommy Ten Names and Nigel "I'm just asking questions" Farage starting riots, but you're not wrong that it's set one hell of an awkward precedent.

Puja

[Son of Mathonwy]

Where's the white-on-white rioting? Let's have some consistency from the far-right, please!

Tough one for the police. Ideally they shouldn't need to release the ethnic or immigration status of a suspect with such rapidity. Who else would need that other than bigots looking for an excuse to smash things? It puts them in a bind if the next homicidal maniac is from a minority. But the police don't really have the luxury of taking the long-term view given what happened last summer.

Whether anyone would really be so quick to riot now given the instant sentencing delivered last year is another question. I predict the next lot of rioters will be heavily masked.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Labour outflanked by Reform on the left. They left an open goal for the arch-opportunist. Even if they do U-turn on the winter fuel allowance and the 2-child benefit cap, Farage will claim (with some justification) that he made it happen.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... t-election

Obviously there's a bond-market-destroying Truss-on-steroids tax cut in there too . . . and a restriction on abortion rights.

[Puja]

Where's the white-on-white rioting? Let's have some consistency from the far-right, please!

Tough one for the police. Ideally they shouldn't need to release the ethnic or immigration status of a suspect with such rapidity. Who else would need that other than bigots looking for an excuse to smash things? It puts them in a bind if the next homicidal maniac is from a minority. But the police don't really have the luxury of taking the long-term view given what happened last summer.

Whether anyone would really be so quick to riot now given the instant sentencing delivered last year is another question. I predict the next lot of rioters will be heavily masked.

And social media continues to go to new lows, as a photograph and name are circulated online, identifying the driver as Peter Cunningham from Huyton in Liverpool... except that's not the person in police custody or a picture of him, that's somebody who is entirely unconnected to the incident and is now in fear for his life and his children's lives in case some vigilante comes after him.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdedg865725o

Puja

[Sandydragon]

Where's the white-on-white rioting? Let's have some consistency from the far-right, please!

Tough one for the police. Ideally they shouldn't need to release the ethnic or immigration status of a suspect with such rapidity. Who else would need that other than bigots looking for an excuse to smash things? It puts them in a bind if the next homicidal maniac is from a minority. But the police don't really have the luxury of taking the long-term view given what happened last summer.

Whether anyone would really be so quick to riot now given the instant sentencing delivered last year is another question. I predict the next lot of rioters will be heavily masked.

And social media continues to go to new lows, as a photograph and name are circulated online, identifying the driver as Peter Cunningham from Huyton in Liverpool... except that's not the person in police custody or a picture of him, that's somebody who is entirely unconnected to the incident and is now in fear for his life and his children's lives in case some vigilante comes after him.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdedg865725o

Puja

That’s shyte and I would like those who spread false rumours to experience some kind of slap for that. This is the utter problem with social media which just doesn’t follow the editorial rules that the traditional media did.