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General UK politics VIII - The Last Tory
- Thread starter Andy_Ross
- Start date
jeremyp
Philosopher
I think GF was taking the mick. I doubt if Starmer really said that or anything like it.
More seriously, if they really want to save money from child benefits, they should consider means testing it.
I'm pretty sure that's been looked at before. It doesn't necessarily save money, since it costs money to administer means testing, and the people most likely to miss out, due to inability to negotiate the hurdles, are those who need it most.
Gulliver Foyle
Philosopher
He literally said they'd "look into it" yesterday. That's politician speak for "no, but I don't want to anger my voters".
Wait for the budget.
Labour cannot afford to make uncoated commitments, but it's clear that the vast majority (I'd say all) Labour MPs in and out of government want to end child poverty. Deploring the lack of this uncosted pledge from the King's Speech when it wouldn't get acted upon until the first budget or mini budget is nothing more than political grandstanding with no impact even if the amendment had passed.
I suspect that ending the cap on universal credit will turn out to be the most cost effective method, but the lack of a firm commitment at this time is not the same as a rejection.
Wudang
BOFH
A senior labour guy was on TV today saying how they were trying to examine the books and finding that most departments that they were told were underspent were actually overspent.
dudalb
Penultimate Amazing
Ihave no love for the Tory Party, but the number of people who eant it destoryed, leaving Labor the only major party and the UK a one party state is scary.
Please, it's the name of the party, not a word with regional variation, so please spell it correctly. It's Labour.
ETA: And your point is bollocks.
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angrysoba
Philosophile
Keep sticking it to those strawmen!
Do you have a template for all of your posts that is something like,
While I don't like X, I am seeing many people who are crazy on Y, and they refuse to see it. Unlike smart me.
Who are you even talking to? Do you think people read your posts and say, "Wow! So true!"?
I want a credible right of centre party, which I could consider voting for, but since I have been an adult, that has not been the Conservative Party, as they have been in thrall to the headbangers Major himself might not have been, but he still appeased the right, or the "*****" (to use his words except that he used a formulation that would violate rule 10 as masked profanity).
I can imagine the Lib Dems moving to occupy that space; they won in Tunbridge Wells, which is prime Tory heartland, and was the location where Sunak was caught on camera boasting that as chancellor he diverted funds from poorer constituencies to places like Tunbridge Wells). They might move a bit to their right but if the Tories mess up next election, I can see it happening.
How many?
jeremyp
Philosopher
If the Conservative Party vanished tomorrow, other parties would rise to take its place (as an opposition not necessarily ideologically). In fact, I would say, in the absence of any other serious opposition) there is a non zero chance that Labour itself might split.
However, there will always be a need for a party to represent people with right of centre political views, so I do not see the Tories being destroyed. What I would like to see is them being purged of the populist corrupt hate mongering politicians that seem to have had a grip on the party recently.
And by "recently" you mean since 1997. And even in 1992 Major had to accommodate them.
malbui
Beauf
- Joined
- Nov 8, 2004
- Messages
- 5,107
Young I was a kind of instinctive Ken Clarke Tory and I’d like there to be a coherent and electable party representing that space. Having said that, and insofar as labels such as left and right are still meaningful, I find myself politically unattached nowadays: I’ve certainly drifted leftwards over the years, but at the same time the whole political debate has drifted rightwards because I’m in a space somewhere on the left of Labour and aligned with the LibDems. Which as a child of the 1970s seems very odd.
Mongrel
Begging for Scraps
Personally what's more scary is the concept of a political party still being relevant despite how their near destruction was entirely due to their own greed & incompetence.
We're still not a one party state, the Tories aren't dead yet, the Lib Dems would would probably claim the moderate Tory voters while Reform would claim the nutters. All Labour have is a large majority, they didn't even beat their 1997 record, and thanks to the parliamentary system they don't get extra benefits once they're past a 'comfortable' majority.
Carrot Flower King
Janitor of Lunacy
Wanting the Tories to be severely damaged is just self-defence or retaliation for those of us whose jobs, ability to earn and pensions were well screwed over by them. Let alone all the other damage they have done to our society.
And if you want to talk about one party states, you might look at which party was in government for most of the 20th century and a good chunk of this one.
junkshop
Otto's Favourite
jeremyp
Philosopher
I'd say the rot really set in in 2016.
True that.
Results from a co-pilot query:
What a lot of folk don't seem to understand is that the country as it is today is pretty much the country the Conservative party has always wanted it to be. The only thing they haven't quite achieved is the complete privatisation of the NHS in England, apart from that the country is "as designed". All the so-called "failings" aren't failings they are "as designed", for instance charities taking over feeding the poorest in the country i.e. foodbanks.