[Politics] Tory meltdown finally arrived [was: incoming]...

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

[tweet]1534806498399989761[/tweet]

Another wheeze is to announce that working people on Universal Credit can get mortgages, but omitting the fact that people need a deposit and savings over £6K on a sliding scale up to £16K means Universal Credit is lowered. Sounds good, but unworkable.

Always jam tomorrow, and blame others when jam is unavailable. Permanently campaigning without producing any results.

Was it Mao who promoted the idea of perpetual revolution to give the impression that the people in charge are in a never-ending quest to improve our lot? Grand announcements, token implementation and then jog on to the next bauble. Meanwhile the elite gang quietly enrich themselves, gorging on the national assets.

If the electorate's eyes start to glaze over, the occasional mention of Captain Hindsight or whatabout Corbyn can be expected to be enough to keep the punters in good order, rather like a cattle prod.

 

[Is it PotG?]

Was it Mao who promoted the idea of perpetual reveolution to give the impression that the people in charge are in a never-ending quest to improve our lot? Grand announcements, token implementation and then jog on to the next bauble. Meanwhile the elite gang quietly enrich themselves, gorging on the national assets.

If the electorate's eyes start to glaze over, the occasional mention of Captain Hindsight or whatabout Corbyn can be expected to be enough to keep the punters in good order, rather like a cattle prod.

Coffee, Popmaster and a political ramble by HWT.

My morning is complete.

 

[beorhthelm]

Maybe I'm being cynical here

IF this housing thing happens I reckon it will be in the form of barely legal housing units. e.g. 37m[SUP]2[/SUP] for a one bed. With one window, absolute minimum build quality, developed by for-profit 'housing associations'*
Or shipping container homes stacked up on old industrial sites.
All priced at the maximum local housing benefit allowance levels.

the policy is to sell on HA to tenants at discounted prices, nothing about building which is the core problem.

what's wrong with building "barely legal" housing, if thats the minimum specification allowed, build lots of it. lets not create new problems with insisting on some inflated standard. for many 37m2 might be fine, not even that small - by happenchance there's a youtube for flat that size in Paris
(good enough for them). elsewhere in the world they go smaller than that.
building modular housing on brownfield sites sounds like a brilliant solution for young people looking for first home, to rent or buy.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Was it Mao who promoted the idea of perpetual reveolution to give the impression that the people in charge are in a never-ending quest to improve our lot? Grand announcements, token implementation and then jog on to the next bauble. Meanwhile the elite gang quietly enrich themselves, gorging on the national assets.

If the electorate's eyes start to glaze over, the occasional mention of Captain Hindsight or whatabout Corbyn can be expected to be enough to keep the punters in good order, rather like a cattle prod.

For Johnson to stay in power, the Tories have to keep inventing 'enemies'. The EU, scroungers, the immigrants, lawyers (now called lefty lawyers) judges (enemies of the people) protestors, etc
This is why the Mail and Express headlines every other day are FURY and/or OUTRAGE

Blame everyone else, take no responsibility.

 

[Pevenseagull]

E.g.

Legal and General are involved in For Profit Housing Associations(sic) and mortgages.

Get a brownfield site, get grants, pay back handers.
Stack and cram in as many of these as new relaxed rules allow https://cambscontainers.co.uk/container-homes/ at a cost of <£25K per unit.
FPHA gives them a nominal value of £100K
Charge 8% on a 100% 35yr mortgage provided by the FPHA.
Charge £90/m service/maintenance/ground rent.
That's £800/m (the max local single person housing benefit)

The developer is in profit yr 4. Loadsa money for backhanders.

The first time buyer has their foot on the property ladder (a ladder with only one rung as the property is actually worth **** all)

Promise delivered!

 

[Machiavelli]

Not sure why you pasted in my witterings about PR - lol! I have since been persuaded that the single transferable vote (I think it's called, where you list your second preference, and counting is a reiterative process where, if no candidate has 50% or more of the vote, the bottom candidate is eliminated and their supporter's second preference votes are transferred to their second preference candidate, and so on till one candidate crosses a 50% rubicon, with the proviso that the transferred votes can only be tansferred once (i.e., the monster raving loony pary supporter's second preference votes may go mostly to the scientology candidate, but when the scientology candidate is eliminated only the second preference of those whose first preference was scientology are transferred)) seems like a good idea.

Not sure what this has to do with Maggie Thatch, who was deposed as an electoral liability rather than because her policies jarred with conventional tory thinking. Certainly she was no compromiser, but the tories will by and large back a winner and shoot a loser in the head.

As for Johnson, I agree entirely. Like a work colleague who has lied to me countless times, there is so much psychopathic charm there that it is almost impossible to dislike them. Well, not charm so much as shameless chutzpah, perhaps. Like another bloke I know who plagiarised one of my articles. When I met him next he greeted me warmly and said "M***, it was too good to change!". And I laughed. I mean, WTF? It will be extremely hard for the tories to ditch Johnson. You won't catch him grizzling like Thatcher, knowing the game is up. The game will never be up for Johnson unless he is deposed in a coup, and recent events show the tory MPs have been taken in. The day after the vote, one MP who voted against him said 'time to move on and back Boris'. Extraordinary.

I'm about to read your response but apologies for including that previous post that I've already responded to. This is purely a matter of my techno-incompetence.

Edit: delighted to hear you've come round to a different voting system.

 

[Machiavelli]

The housing situation is as a result of 40 years worth of policy, which needs a radical overhaul in order to address the mire we're in. That's the same with so many policy issues.

What I wanted to write earlier (been a busy day) was that the 8.10 interview that Amul Rajan did with Michael Gove was a must-listen. Rajan is a class act, although my hunch is that one or two on here won't like him. Gove is the only remaining figure in the Cabinet who has both brilliant communication skills and an intellect. I've never before heard him being slaughtered in an interview, but he was this morning. See:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0018126

I suspect it'll be 2 hours 10 minutes in.

 

[Guinness Boy]

The housing situation is as a result of 40 years worth of policy, which needs a radical overhaul in order to address the mire we're in. That's the same with so many policy issues.

What I wanted to write earlier (been a busy day) was that the 8.10 interview that Amul Rajan did with Michael Gove was a must-listen. Rajan is a class act, although my hunch is that one or two on here won't like him. Gove is the only remaining figure in the Cabinet who has both brilliant communication skills and an intellect. I've never before heard him being slaughtered in an interview, but he was this morning. See:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0018126

I suspect it'll be 2 hours 10 minutes in.

Yep, I heard that too. Rajan is brilliant. Gove was all over the shop.

 

[Lever]

Just reading the housing posts. Here in Faversham the first stage of a massive expansion is underway. Houses are filling the fields surrounding the town. So far there is no sign of any infrastructure uppage. This means the traffic here is getting absurd. The A2 is often clogged. All through town there is a 20 mph speed limit now (which I like, but which is rountinely ingored by the 40 mph wankers). Often I have had to do a U turn and cross town via an unvonventional route owing to a half mile queue in the middle of town.

No new schools built, and the only two non housing additions are a Lidl and a Holiday Inn on the Ashford road.

The new houses themselves are big, with tiny windows and gardens, plus small runs of 'affordable' (and rather shitty looking) terrace runs, or flats. The locations mean that folk must drive into town to shop, and most likely drive and park to use the station for work (most new owners are escapees from London); the Lycra option is a non-starter as our London trains will not allow bikes on at rush hour, apart from fold-ups, and there is only so much room for them in the door wells.

Madness. Some extra roads, some road widening, some better parking, some new focal points . . . . not rocker science but it would cut the profits... absolutely no notice taken of Prince Charles' vanity model village project.

Likewise Mid Sussex...

https://www.cuckfieldlife.co.uk/cuckfield-blog/tag/Cuckstye+proposal

 

[Guinness Boy]

The housing situation is as a result of 40 years worth of policy, which needs a radical overhaul in order to address the mire we're in. That's the same with so many policy issues.

What I wanted to write earlier (been a busy day) was that the 8.10 interview that Amul Rajan did with Michael Gove was a must-listen. Rajan is a class act, although my hunch is that one or two on here won't like him. Gove is the only remaining figure in the Cabinet who has both brilliant communication skills and an intellect. I've never before heard him being slaughtered in an interview, but he was this morning. See:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0018126

I suspect it'll be 2 hours 10 minutes in.

Yep, I heard that too. Rajan is brilliant. Gove was all over the shop.

In fact I just listened back to it and there is an extraordinary point in it where Gove makes reference to the 2008 financial crisis without the slightest bit of awareness that what caused that, ultimately, were US Sub Prime mortgages, and sub-prime mortgages appear to be a large part of this "new" policy as Gove explained it

If they're not at it already expect the right wing Twitterati and their slavish followers on here to start painting Rajan as lefty, woke, only got the job because he's BAME and a louche member of the elite who was a food critic when there are people in this world who have to eat Tesco Value or some other such nonsense.

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

[tweet]1534806498399989761[/tweet]

Another wheeze is to announce that working people on Universal Credit can get mortgages, but omitting the fact that people need a deposit and savings over £6K on a sliding scale up to £16K means Universal Credit is lowered. Sounds good, but unworkable.

Always jam tomorrow, and blame others when jam is unavailable. Permanently campaigning without producing any results.

Johnson has thrown so many dead cats on the table that the RSPCA should get involved.

 

[usernamed]

Tory meltdown incoming...

Johnson has thrown so many dead cats on the table that the RSPCA should get involved.

Yup, I’m surprised nobody’s got to work in Photoshop and superimposed our glorious leader’s head onto the Brighton Cat Killer’s body. How is there no “Downing Street Cat Killer” meme?

 

[Lever]

I'm sure there are several on all sides who do it....... but it is interesting when they get caught out....

https://twitter.com/UKGovtGoogles/status/1526309530199392257?s=20&t=C_I8zszGA4-d2vwecR-fOQ

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I'm about to read your response but apologies for including that previous post that I've already responded to. This is purely a matter of my techno-incompetence.

Edit: delighted to hear you've come round to a different voting system.

Ha! Well, I'm never going to be set in my ways, and I rather like what I know understand. I had a strong antipathy to 'PR' as I though I knew it, blocking my willingness to give it a second look, since PR often weemed to me to be presented as a system to ensure the greens, communists and BNP got some seats. I now see it is much more nuanced and yet a system that could be used that is neither complicated not disenfranchising (too complicated for 'yer average' voter)

 

[Audax]

Said it before, I'll say it again: UK should emulate the Aussie system (but with voluntary voting).

First: take the current FPTP system, rip it out, replace with AV. The only thing that needs to change there for voters is reminding them to number candidates in order of preference instead of just marking 1 box. You could even allow some boxes to be left empty, to cater for those who genuinely only want to vote for one candidate.

Next: rip out the unelected House of Lords and replace it with an elected House that uses the STV system of PR, similar to the Aussie system.

Yes, it runs the risk of allowing in a couple of loonies for the replacement to the HoL. But those loonies will certainly never find themselves in an actual position to influence policy, as other parties will outnumber them massively. Once you have the new body in place, give it some actual power to act as a moderating influence on the government - genuine power to scrutinise and potentially reject badly written legislation.

 

[nicko31]

Almost non existent in the UK press...

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/12/world/europe/russian-money-uk-tories.html

One of the biggest donors to Britain’s Conservative Party is suspected of secretly funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars to the party from a Russian account, according to a bank alert filed to Britain’s national law enforcement agency.

The donation, of $630,225, was made in February 2018 in the name of Ehud Sheleg, a wealthy London art dealer who was most recently the Conservative Party’s treasurer. The money was part of a fund-raising blitz that helped propel Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his party to a landslide victory in the 2019 general election.....

 

[dazzer6666]

Not sure what they are going to call BurgessHillAnstyCuckfieldHurstpierpointHaywardsHeath when it’s finished………..Crawley South possibly ?

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

Not sure what they are going to call BurgessHillAnstyCuckfieldHurstpierpointHaywardsHeath when it’s finished………..Crawley South possibly ?

Is Hassocks not in that bundle?

 

[smiler]

Not sure what they are going to call BurgessHillAnstyCuckfieldHurstpierpointHaywardsHeath when it’s finished………..Crawley South possibly ?

Over Ansty/Cuckfield/Hurstpierpoint/Haywards Heath residents dead bodies!!

 

[Machiavelli]

Ha! Well, I'm never going to be set in my ways, and I rather like what I know understand. I had a strong antipathy to 'PR' as I though I knew it, blocking my willingness to give it a second look, since PR often weemed to me to be presented as a system to ensure the greens, communists and BNP got some seats. I now see it is much more nuanced and yet a system that could be used that is neither complicated not disenfranchising (too complicated for 'yer average' voter)

I also like being shown that I'm wrong, and have had to revise a fair few of my views over the years but, just in case you hadn't noticed, I can and do dig in hard when I think the need is there.
In terms of UK parties and PR, I'd add that things have changed enormously for Labour since the turn of the millennium. Prior to that, FPTP has worked brilliantly for them, despite the fact that the Tories have governed for 70 years or so out over the past century (clue: Labour have governed in the remaining years). The loss of Scottish MPs as a result of the rise of the SNP means that forming a majority government becomes increasingly unlikely. While most will not engage with talk about PR, pacts, etc this side of an election, there may be some movement on the other side (or going into the following one). I say this, because I'm now increasingly convinced that the next government won't be a Tory one, irrespective of what they do with Johnson.