Keir Starmer

[Gnasher]

9 minutes ago, Bruce Spanner said:

Could be more to this than meets the eye...

 

If this is a smart move, knowing the government has a majority and will see it through anyway, then getting the back benchers, and the opposition, at each other’s throats might be a welcome distraction from our ongoing clusterfuck.

 

BUDGET BUNFIGHT: Labour leader Keir Starmer signaled he would oppose any rise to corporation tax at yesterday’s prime minister’s questions, setting up the unlikely scene next week where Corbynistas are agreeing with Sunak that taxes on business should increase, but right-wing Tory backbenchers are siding with the Labour leadership in opposing the hike. The Times’ Steve Swinford says Tory rebels could vote with Labour to block a proposed increase, with Chief Whip Mark Spencer warning a revolt would effectively be seen as a confidence vote in the PM with rebels stripped of the Tory whip. This is fast becoming the story of the pre-budget.

"Right wing tory backbenchers are sliding with the labour leadership"  

 

[The Guest]

“Starmer isn’t right wing though.  Nobody in Labour is right wing.  You’re a conspiracy theorist.”

[Vincent Vega]

No chance any MPs will rebel if it means losing the whip, not in any meaningful numbers anyway. They’ll put as much pressure on as they can, but I suspect none of them have the spine to risk actually losing their cushy number as an MP down the line.

[Bruce Spanner]

1 minute ago, Vincent Vega said:

No chance any MPs will rebel if it means losing the whip, not in any meaningful numbers anyway. They’ll put as much pressure on as they can, but I suspect none of them have the spine to risk actually losing their cushy number as an MP down the line.

Most likely, I doubt there’ll be much trouble with the threat of the whip being removed.

 

Interesting analysis/take nevertheless.

[Denny Crane]

 

 

Sienna Rodgers

@siennamarla

Replying to

@siennamarla

NEW: Anna Rothery’s campaign spokeswoman says “Anna is pursuing legal action on the grounds of racial discrimination

 

 

 

[Jack the Sipper]

1 hour ago, Gnasher said:

"Right wing tory backbenchers are sliding with the labour leadership"  

 

Which is what they did during the Brexit votes in the last Parliament.

[Denny Crane]

I'm less bothered about who sides with who  - more the principle that corporation tax is too low and is one of the lowest in Europe. It's hard not to deny Labour are taking a fiscally conservative stance on this matter.

 

So in the past week alone conservative stance on drugs, failure to critique Hancock and anti- democratic shenanigans in the Liverpool mayoral race. 

 

[Gnasher]

1 hour ago, Denny Crane said:

I'm less bothered about who sides with who  - more the principle that corporation tax is too low and is one of the lowest in Europe. It's hard not to deny Labour are taking a fiscally conservative stance on this matter.

 

So in the past week alone conservative stance on drugs, failure to critique Hancock and anti- democratic shenanigans in the Liverpool mayoral race. 

 

But other than that...

[Denny Crane]

Labour are fighting the last war aren't they. Or maybe seeking donations from hedge funds and various others.

 

 

 

 

 

[Jairzinho]

[Gnasher]

Drinking game. Start at midday. Put on news channel. Have a stiff drink everytime you see a politician interveiwed with a union jack in shot. Crawling on floor mumbling rule britannia by tea time.

[cloggypop]

41 minutes ago, Gnasher said:

Drinking game. Start at midday. Put on news channel. Have a stiff drink everytime you see a politician interveiwed with a union jack in shot. Crawling on floor mumbling rule britannia by tea time.

Is this your daily routine? 

[Vincent Vega]

 

[Bruce Spanner]

This might go some way to explaining things...

 

Death by focus group.

 

'For the first five years of the 2010s, the deficit seemed to be on everyone’s lips. A belief in the need to control spending carried the Conservatives through two general elections. But by the time I started conducting focus groups in 2016, the deficit or the debt were barely mentioned. So salient in the David Cameron years, it had all but disappeared from the public’s mind as attention turned to Brexit.

 

You would not know it from Westminster, but once more that picture is changing. Though the public were and are hugely supportive of Rishi Sunak’s furlough scheme, there was a ripple of concern detectable in focus groups at the time about the eventual need to “pay it back”. That has since developed into a firmer view, brought up unprompted, that though coronavirus support is needed for now, “we cannot keep borrowing for ever”, that the country will need to get on top of this debt, and an acknowledgment that there will be tough times ahead as we do so. This applies just as much in the “red wall” seats of the north of England and the Midlands as elsewhere.

 

The quality of economic responsibility – closely wedded to the careful management of the public finances – is a key demand from voters, and one of the main measures they will use to weigh up their choice at the next election. For Labour, this is important because the economy is their number one weakness; voters still worry that it would be “just like last time” if they were elected again, and concerns about their handling of the economy is the top hesitation about voting for the party in the red wall. For the Conservatives, it is important because – in the absence of Brexit and Corbyn, so key to turning votes blue in 2019 – they need the clear dividing line with Labour that the economy provides.

 

But parties should not assume this shift in the public mood is a wholesale return to the early 2010s. The means by which people want their political leaders to be economically responsible has shifted. In December 2009, a YouGov poll showed that 52% of people preferred spending cuts to tackle the deficit over tax rises, with the latter being the choice of 30%. In 2020, the picture has reversed: only 27% opted for spending cuts, 47% for tax rises. This trend is true for both Labour and Conservative voters, as a poll for Ipsos Mori also shows.

 

Polling now shows support for changes to capital gains tax, and an increase to corporation tax. More people than not want to see taxes increase on online retailers, who they feel have avoided paying their fair share for years – they have supplanted the banks as the business bogeyman of the British people. And, increasingly, people are open to paying more tax themselves. In a recent focus group I ran, seven of the eight respondents said they would do so if ring-fenced for the NHS, as a way of “paying back in” after the pandemic. Asking people how much they would be willing to pay on a weekly or monthly basis shows people are more relaxed about the prospect than for a long time.There is a difference between permission for tax rises and a public clamouring to have more of their money taken by the state. No party is going to be punished for not raising tax. Some taxes remain unpopular whatever – a VAT rise, for example, is only the top choice of 4% of voters.

 

But for the main parties, it does present a new political opportunity. If changes to taxation were framed as part of people’s contribution to a national effort as we rebuild from the pandemic, or as an act of paying back to our NHS, there is the potential for a powerful new narrative tapping into this new public consensus – a desire to tackle the debt, but through fair tax rises rather than reduced spending.

 

Some Tories get this, with talk of windfall taxes and the chancellor’s message on the need to be fiscally responsible. But there is nervousness about embracing it, particularly among a pack of Conservative MPs hostile towards any change. Oddly enough, Labour is even further away, attacking a version of the Conservative party that stopped existing quite some time ago over austerity, and opposing tax rises – even the corporation tax rise said to be a key part of Rishi Sunak’s upcoming budget. If Labour does go ahead and set itself up in opposition to this measure next week, it risks letting the Conservatives walk away with the spoils, able to further project themselves as the party of the workers. Starmer’s calculation on tax seems based on a dated perception of the voter Labour needs to win – more Tony Blair’s southern “Mondeo man” than the working-class, traditionally Labour voter in the north and the Midlands. Imagine if Starmer stood up last week and said he wanted to see a general tax rise (with a higher rate for higher earners) to fund a pay boost for our beleaguered NHS staff, challenging the Conservatives to do the same. You do not need to be well-versed in public opinion to know that would have created a bigger impression than a policy about bond markets.

 

Of course, tax can go wrong. The chancellor will need to tread carefully. Anything that felt unfair while working people were having to pay more, such as lifting the bankers’ bonus cap, could unwind support for the whole thing and poison the Conservative brand with voters who are still nervous about what they did with their ballots in December 2019. If there is a tax rise, including, say, the freezing of the personal allowance, there will need to be a counter-balance – such as a higher rate for higher earners, or higher tax on big business – that is framed as part of the same package.

 

But, navigated correctly, there is a new consensus up for grabs, quietly hidden among the voters. It may just be that the real victor of British politics is the person or party that takes the opportunity to grasp it, defining and differentiating themselves as they do so. Johnson, Starmer, Sunak, Dodds: are any of them brave enough?'

[Section_31]

Racial discrimination? BLM? Erm....what? 

[Denny Crane]

49 minutes ago, Section_31 said:

Racial discrimination? BLM? Erm....what? 

I reckon the antisemitism saga has set a precedent. I mean if certain Labour people and the media go around calling the Labour party institutionally racist for long enough -- then here we are. 

[Gnasher]

5 hours ago, cloggypop said:

Is this your daily routine? 

Not far off. Like to start a bit earlier.

[Gnasher]

 

 

I get the feeling this analyst is a glass half full sort of guy..

 

 

[Neil G]

He’s a left winger taking the piss, there is no New Statesman article.

[Nelly-Szoboszlai]

Keir has gone nuclear... 

[Neil G]

3 minutes ago, Nelly-Torres said:

Keir has gone nuclear... 

Labour’s default position for most of the last 75 years, not a big deal and not a vote loser in and of itself.

[Scooby Dudek]

23 minutes ago, Neil G said:

Labour’s default position for most of the last 75 years, not a big deal and not a vote loser in and of itself.

The left of the party and I include myself in this, would be absolutely crazy to make a big deal of it. It has been policy since 1987 and was in the 2019 election manifesto. 

The media will be absolutely on the look out for people decrying the change in tone.

[Gnasher]

Whats the point if squabbling over a couple of hundred billion quid?

 

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jul/17/trident-renewal-205bn-arguments-for-against

 

Although it does work because they tested the piece of junk in 2017 and it fucked off in the wrong direction and headed straight to America. So it does have its plus points.

 

https://www.channel4.com/news/failed-trident-missile-test

 

[Section_31]

The nuclear thing is interesting in that it brings different aspects of the party into play. There'll be the more Liberal types that want rid, but then defence is a huge employer often with unionised workforces, how do you reconcile that?

[Jairzinho]

4 minutes ago, Section_31 said:

The nuclear thing is interesting in that it brings different aspects of the party into play. There'll be the more Liberal types that want rid, but then defence is a huge employer often with unionised workforces, how do you reconcile that?

You do what the unionised work forces want. 

 

Also, liking nukes makes you patriotic.