UK General Discussion: 2017 and onwards, Mayhem

[ViaActiva]

If I were May (some concessions to party unity here)

Prime Minister: Theresa May
Leader of the House of Commons: Jeremy Hunt
Chancellor of the Exchequer: Amber Rudd
Foreign Secretary: Rory Stewart
Home Secretary: Brandon Lewis
Brexit Secretary: David Davis
International Trade Secretary: Liam Fox
Defence Secretary: Gavin Williamson
Health Secretary: Sarah Wollaston
Education Secretary: Penny Mordaunt
Justice Secretary/Lord Chancellor: David Liddington
BEIS: George Freeman
Transport: Dominic Raab
DCLG: Sajid Javid
DWP: David Gauke
DfID: Tom Tugendhat
DDCMS: Tracey Crouch
DEFRA: Michael Gove
Scotland: David Mundell
Wales: Alun Cairns
NI: James Brokenshire
Chief Secretary to the Treasury: Justine Greening
Minister of State for the Cabinet Office: Neil O'Brien
Chairman of the Conservative Party: James Cleverly
Chief Whip: Julian Smith

[ViaActiva]

If I were May (some concessions to party unity here)

Prime Minister: Theresa May
Leader of the House of Commons: Jeremy Hunt
Chancellor of the Exchequer: Amber Rudd
Foreign Secretary: Rory Stewart
Home Secretary: Brandon Lewis
Brexit Secretary: David Davis
International Trade Secretary: Liam Fox
Defence Secretary: Gavin Williamson
Health Secretary: Sarah Wollaston
Education Secretary: Penny Mordaunt
Justice Secretary/Lord Chancellor: David Liddington
BEIS: George Freeman
Transport: Dominic Raab
DCLG: Sajid Javid
DWP: David Gauke
DfID: Tom Tugendhat
DDCMS: Tracey Crouch
DEFRA: Michael Gove
Scotland: David Mundell
Wales: Alun Cairns
NI: James Brokenshire
Chief Secretary to the Treasury: Justine Greening
Minister of State for the Cabinet Office: Neil O'Brien
Chairman of the Conservative Party: James Cleverly
Chief Whip: Julian Smith

Wouldn't getting rid of Boris Johnson just increase the chances he will try to stir up things to become the next PM.  Maybe move him somewhere else, I am thinking of Transport/Infrastructure as that would go well for a previous mayor of the largest city.

True - I guess it depends whether May can survive the risk of Boris outside of the tent trying to whip up the Brexiteers, he's quite unpopular with most of the Parliamentary Party (but not the activists) so maybe she could.

You're right that he'd be best placed in a less important Cabinet role - Transport / DCLG / or DDCMS, though there have been press reports that he threatened to quit if offered a demotion.

[ViaActiva]

If I were May (some concessions to party unity here)

Prime Minister: Theresa May
Leader of the House of Commons: Jeremy Hunt
Chancellor of the Exchequer: Amber Rudd
Foreign Secretary: Rory Stewart
Home Secretary: Brandon Lewis
Brexit Secretary: David Davis
International Trade Secretary: Liam Fox
Defence Secretary: Gavin Williamson
Health Secretary: Sarah Wollaston
Education Secretary: Penny Mordaunt
Justice Secretary/Lord Chancellor: David Liddington
BEIS: George Freeman
Transport: Dominic Raab
DCLG: Sajid Javid
DWP: David Gauke
DfID: Tom Tugendhat
DDCMS: Tracey Crouch
DEFRA: Michael Gove
Scotland: David Mundell
Wales: Alun Cairns
NI: James Brokenshire
Chief Secretary to the Treasury: Justine Greening
Minister of State for the Cabinet Office: Neil O'Brien
Chairman of the Conservative Party: James Cleverly
Chief Whip: Julian Smith

Wouldn't getting rid of Boris Johnson just increase the chances he will try to stir up things to become the next PM.  Maybe move him somewhere else, I am thinking of Transport/Infrastructure as that would go well for a previous mayor of the largest city.

True - I guess it depends whether May can survive the risk of Boris outside of the tent trying to whip up the Brexiteers, he's quite unpopular with most of the Parliamentary Party (but not the activists) so maybe she could.

You're right that he'd be best placed in a less important Cabinet role - Transport / DCLG / or DDCMS, though there have been press reports that he threatened to quit if offered a demotion.

Transport is still a very important one and based on his background as London mayor seems more suited as generally mayors tend to have more expertise in infrastructure and transport which is a major issue for cities as opposed to foreign policy.  Also he might cause the Tories problems passing the re-distribution is the re-distribution of his constituency would have him losing it as it includes a sizeable chunk of John McDonnell's constituency so he might vote against yet the new boundaries as a whole are better for the Tories than the current ones.  He also isn't the only Tory hurt, Kenneth Clarke under the new boundaries would be far more vulnerable as he would have only won by 2 points instead of 13 as he loses much of the southern rural parts which go heavily conservative while maintains the southern suburbs of Nottingham which the two parties split pretty evenly in and Labour even made some inroads due to changing demographics.  That being said I don't think boundary changes are a confidence vote that the government would fall on anyways.

Don't disagree about the fundamental importance of Transport but it really isn't seen that way in Whitehall - ministers have been shuttled in and out for years without any long-term view about the nation's infrastructure. For a politician holding a great office of state to move there would be seen as a demotion, and if you believe the briefing in the press Boris has taken this view.

On boundaries, I think most people agree that they're unlikely to get through now as the majority isn't there. Think the Tories will eventually have to compromise on minor boundaries changes w. 650 MPs in the future.

[ViaActiva]

Which puts you safely out of the country a lot of the time.

True - certainly helped for Brown re: David Miliband.

[ViaActiva]

Eh not a fan of Johnson but not sure that evidence is that damning. He only needs the Tory members (which is not unlikely if there is a leadership election) to become leader and then it's probably still all to play for in an election against Corbyn.

Despite his recent slide in popularity he still has the ability to talk to non-political voters in way that Cameron and May couldn't, although on the flip side, he also has the potential to crash and burn on a massive scale - could go either way really. Wouldn't want to see him as PM or Tory leader in any case.

[ViaActiva]

True Boris Johnson has lousy approval ratings, but it seems for the most part both parties have a solid floor of 38% and a ceiling of 45%.  Now if it is 45% Tory to 38% Labour, that is a strong Tory majority but with 45% Labour to 38% Tory that still puts Labour slightly shy of a majority if you have a uniform swing.  The only way either can win a big majority is if one falls below 38% and this can only happen if one of the third parties does better.  If one of the third parties rises then its possible to win a majority like David Cameron in 2015, or Tony Blair in 2005 with under 40%, but not when you have weak third parties.  So Boris winning a general election should be completely dismissed even though he probably would be more of a liability than asset.

A swing of 0.5% to the Tories would give them a majority of 4, a swing of 1% a majority of 20 (higher than Cameron's victory). Not saying this is the likeliest outcome but certainly plausible that a more competent Tory campaign and continued distrust of Corbyn could deliver this.

Eh not a fan of Johnson but not sure that evidence is that damning. He only needs the Tory members (which is not unlikely if there is a leadership election) to become leader and then it's probably still all to play for in an election against Corbyn.

Seriously? He's more unpopular than May now, even when posted as a hypothetical, and not as a reality (where the benefit of the doubt is soon rescinded as a bad idea). He's been found out, his clown acts only work when he's not tasked with hugely important roles and then found royally ing them up.

Only marginally more unpopular on the evidence shown, and while certainly I think it's a problem for him I don't think it's terminal given Corbyn is not far off from both May and Johnson in unpopularity! -30% is not unprecedented - Cameron came pretty close in 2012 and Ed Miliband reached it often. Not impossible that Johnson could do better than May 2017 given the Opposition.

In any case, I very much doubt that most voters are paying attention or have any idea about the Foreign Secretary's job performance (even though I would agree with you). In this sense it's the same as mid-term polls - to be taken with a great pinch of salt.

[ViaActiva]

Bear in mind varyingly that

1. Most people don't pay attention outside of election season and probably are unaware or don't care about the details of BoJo's mishaps or May's hillarious fail of a reshuffle

2. May probably can't go before Brexit

3. The next GE probably can't be before Brexit

4. Brexit will be a disaster in any case and there will be a lot of furious Brexit and remainer Tories hanging around (and we already know Brexit Labour supporters were largely happy to stay with Corbyn Labour)

5. The British economy will be weaker, and this will hurt the public's confidence in the Tory's economic management

It seems like the context of the next GE will be hugely beneficial to Labour, regardless of who is in charge of the Conservatives at that point

Agree with 1, 2, 3 (though 2 and 3 may be beyond May's control due to events).

Agree in principle with 4 and 5 but I think the effects will be longer-term than you suggest. If this Parliament lasts the course and we have an election in 2021 (2019/2020 may be more likely) then at this time we'll still be in a transition arrangement (unless Brexiteers take over and crash us out) and negotiating a FTA with the EU and other countries. Most experts think that an FTA with the EU can only be completed by the mid-2020s at the earliest, which is after the next election and the impacts may take a few years. Voters may give the Tories credit that they have seen through our exit, at least on paper, at the next election even though the full effects are a while off.

So we may not know the true economic impact of Brexit until 2030, and it's probably likely to be economic stagnation rather than a sudden crash (basically with an elderly population we'll become Japan).

[ViaActiva]

Izzard can never catch a break can he? He's turning into the Harold Stassen of UK politics.

[ViaActiva]

Looks like UKIP has run out of chances - local elections may be their death knell.

Makes you wonder how they would have turned out with a narrow Remain vote.

[ViaActiva]

https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/5418556/tory-backbench-boss-sir-graham-brady-begs-angry-mps-not-to-call-leadership-contest/

With this and Boris' manoeuvres, is it finally happening I wonder?

[ViaActiva]

Thinking about tea leaves for Tory leadership contest if it happens, sorted by Brexiteer / moderate:

Likely to run:

Boris Johnson

Gavin Williamson
Amber Rudd

Could run

Michael Gove
Dominic Raab
Penny Mordaunt
Priti Patel
Andrea Leadsom

Jeremy Hunt
Justine Greening
Rory Stewart
George Freeman
Tom Tugendhat

Unlikely to run

David Davis
Liam Fox
Jacob Rees-Mogg

Philip Hammond


I think one of the Brexiteer 'could runs' would be in with a real shot in this scenario. Not what I want but likely given the Tory activist base.

[ViaActiva]

Strongly in favour of government investing more in temporary accommodation and social housing but think that this proposal is a bit half-baked.

Back of a fag packet calculation - if you were looking at the cheapest areas of the country (e.g. Stoke and Burnley) i.e. you would be prepared to ask people to re-locate, the majority of whom will be in inner cities, and assuming an average price of around £50,000 (doubt there's 8,000 at the very low end) then this would be £400m. A significant but not huge sum in fiscal terms.

But some immediate considerations:

1) Would be extremely expensive - likely billions of pounds of taxpayer money if purchasing property near to where the majority of homeless people currently live i.e. inner cities.

2) The 8,000 figure is only for homeless people sleeping rough at a point in time - the total figure is significantly higher at 60,000, most of whom are in temporary accommodation or staying with others for short periods of time. Local authorities would have to decide who was in priority need, adding resource pressure.

3) A significant number of homeless people have some form of mental health and/or alcohol/drug dependence problem. If you were re-locating them as above then you may be completely cutting them off from existing support networks and placing them in an unfamiliar environment where they get much worse. Even you found accommodation nearby this won't immediately improve the lives of the people who would probably be far better supported in temporary accommodation.

4) Would they have to pay rent? In which case there would be an added fiscal cost in terms of subsidising this through housing benefit (which is not cheap!). If not, then there is an issue of incentives and equity if the state is providing this for free while people on minimum wage jobs are paying rent / saving for a deposit. Unless there is some form of conditionality to the homeless person staying in that property i.e. a six month time-limit (potentially defeats the purpose) or support available (expensive).

TL;DR: far better to invest in existing means of support for homeless people and build more social housing.


As for the government requisitioning private property - say goodbye to any foreign investment in the UK in the coming decades, with horrendous consequences for everyone living here.

[ViaActiva]

Bold prediction: David Lammy runs for leadership more than a decade after his expiration date as the personification of everything wrong with Remoan Twitter and received a well-deserved single-digit result.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsR4Nx-ELgc



I'd add Keir Starmer to the list of names mentioned - probably the only candidate who would attract support from all sections of the party. Not that he'd necessarily win of course with the leftward tilt of the party membership. Whoever positions themselves as Corbyn's natural successor would be the favourite.

[ViaActiva]

The protests today are inspiring, and it's good to see the pushback start in force before it's too late.

So because I support Corbyn, I'm anti-Semitic?

No, but you're endorsing a moral coward for Prime Minister who has tolerated anti-semitism for years.

[ViaActiva]

Posting John Rentoul tweets (let alone his actual work) should result in a permaban for the first offense and actual jail time for the second. I'm not joking.

Mind explaining which points of the tweets you disagree with?

[ViaActiva]

I think I agree with that Mileslunn, though the near future looks very uncertain with the Tory Party still split down the middle on our future relationship with Europe and the potential for Brexiteers to become frustrated if the transition period (as it likely will) needs to be extended into the mid 2020s once we get into the complexities of an FTA. May’s leadership is uncertain and she could be replaced in 2019/2020 by a Brexiteer who is popular with members but divisive in the country.

On the flip side the Tories may receive quite a boost in April 2019 given that the general consensus in the country on both sides is  ‘stop arguing and get on with Brexit’. This may restore May’s reputation somewhat and shift the focus back to issues of credibility and competence in running the country, although as above the issue is not going to die away.

But I agree that Labour would have a better chance under a less divisive leader. 2017 was really the perfect storm for Corbyn - no one expected him to be in government and it was really a referendum on May’s terrible and hubristic campaign. Someone less divisive to swing voters like Angela Rayner maybe.

[ViaActiva]

I agree with both of you in a sense that Corbyn has attracted voters who would otherwise not vote or vote Green, but I think he also worries a good number of (particularly older) swing and traditional Labour voters at the same time. How far that balances out I don’t know, and perhaps Labour will get stronger with demographic changes if the Tory Party doesn’t adapt.

Personally as someone who voted Labour in 2015 and previous elections (switching to Lib Dem in 2017)  I was surprised last year at the number of centre-left or previously apolitical friends who were ecstatic that Labour had given May and the Tories a bloody nose, despite  empowering the hard left in the Labour Party. The hubris and tone set by May basically started a culture war seemingly directed against the young, which has been a far more important driver of Labour’s support than their policies.

If Corbyn does get into power it is going to be such a car crash of Trumpian proportions that a lot of people are going to be disillusioned and regretful.

[ViaActiva]

Around 1994, the British Tories faced similar troubles, but were trailing by 15-20 points in the polls rather than slightly ahead thus I believe, even though some disagree, more evidence that Labour would be doing better with a more centrist leader (maybe not as centrist as Tony Blair, but similar to traditional social democratic party leaders in continental Europe not loony left like Corbyn).

Imo loony left was a tagline often used to attack people who support gay rights, elected police oversight and race relations work. All things which are now mainstream in the Conservative Party!

Those were never the main points of contention: these are the people who have argued for mass nationalisation, instinctively hostile to and with no understanding of business, unilateral disarmanent, sympathy for the IRA, USSR/Russia, Hamas/Hezbollah, Venezuela, anyone who isn’t the United States no matter how depraved and/or authoritarian they are.

Not a Labour supporter but for the sake of reasonable Oppositon in an ideal world I’d like to see someone like Angela Rayner, Hilary Benn, Stephen Kinnock or Liz Kendall though doubt the last three would get anywhere in the modern Labour Party.

[ViaActiva]

Not sure if lumping any of those people together with Williamson - who is a rather... erm... singular... Member of Parliament in certain respects - is particularly fair...

Just off the top of my head...

Diane Abbott said that Mao did more good than harm. https://youtube.com/watch?v=uB4o5n2EGyA

John McDonnell joked about an Opposition MP being lynched and going back in time to murder Margaret Thatcher and has repeatedly refused to apologise.
 
I can’t think of anything particularly nasty or crazy from Skinner although his entire career seems to have consisted of partisan hectoring rather than any genuine contribution to public debate or policy (beyond the job description of your average constituency MP).

[ViaActiva]

Say what you like about McDonnell but he's done very very well on his brief at the Treasury. You can call him a lot of things, but he's not incompetent.

He has been better than expected in projecting a calm bank manager image and clearly has some grey matter but that’s not particularly re-assuring if the ideas themselves are still crazy. I think it’s a huge stretch to say he has done ‘very very well’ as Shadow Chancellor when even has admitted that a Labour govt would cause a run on the pound.

He’s a nasty, spiteful and highly narrow-minded man who should not let anywhere near the public finances or economic policy.

[ViaActiva]

As for Cat Smith, don't know much about her, but David Cameron once commented she made an intelligent question and suggested she run for Labour leader, although maybe that was tongue and cheek.  As for the names mentioned, just pointing out they are quite left wing.  Now to be fair maybe there is a market for that, after all there is no shortage of countries including the US have leaders that most would consider too far right to be electable (In Europe you have Poland and Hungary) so more just an observation.

Miles, please listen: the public don't care about left or right or centre. That is the domain of the political anorak.

Again, is this really true? I always thought ideology did matter in the UK, more than say America. Liverpool tends to vote Labour, and Surrey Tory.

Yes there are strong tribal loyalties in British politics - a lot of people will vote Labour/Tory because ‘that’s what our family always does’ - this acts as a barrier to the success of a third party as it was to the SDP/Liberals in the 1980s. The extent to which people vote on different degrees of politics (hard-left/centre-left) is a slightly more nuanced point but I think still true.

Many hard-left positions are not popular: huge public borrowing (the most effective post-crash Conservative argument), hostility to business and the private economy in which the majority of people work (e.g. Corbyn faced a lot of criticism for proposing to raise taxes on small businesses), weakness on national security and defence (in this he is out of step with the majority of working-class people). Now higher public spending and an end to austerity are popular, but this doesn’t look credible if it is based on borrowing as above (When asked if they want more spending on public services the public will always say yes, but asked if they want higher taxes / borrowing they will say no) The Tories failure to make this argument and stress their economic credentials was a key reason why 2017 looked so different to 2015 (that and the Tories’ Brexit culture war as stated earlier).

Perceptions about ideology matter the other way too - many swing voters vote for the Tories e.g. because they think they’ll be better for the economy but still don’t entirely trust the party, viewing it as the ‘nasty party’  of privilege, narrow interests, intolerance towards ethnic minorities etc.

[ViaActiva]

Miles, you're clearly a Sweet Lad and a Good Boy but please take your takes regarding sectarian politics in Labour elsewhere. (Or at the very least condense them into one or two sentences)

Do you ever make any contribution to the discussion apart from trying to shut out those you don’t agree with?

[ViaActiva]

The one take away from everything to happen since 2015 is that politics in Britain is deeply divided. Just look at the Scottish indie referendum, which has managed to virtually flip decade old voting patterns.

The same with Brexit\Corbyn. No leader/party is popular within British politics; 45% of the electorate hate it, the other 45% will love it and then 10% won’t care.

It’s why assertations that higher borrowing or other corbynite polices are unpopular are questionable; all the polling shows that Labour voters e.g now 40% of the electorate support it.

Heck Corbyn said that are foreign policy causes terrorism: a position that made Westminster shriek, but one which what 40% of the public agree with.

Agree that politics in the UK is increasingly polarised but as I mentioned before there was hardly any scrutiny of Corbyn's actual policies during the election as no-one expected him to win (there was the whole Tory attack line of a 'coalition of chaos' which I thought was entirely misjudged as it detracted from the toxic substance of his policies). It was almost entirely a referendum on May's leadership that catastrophically backfired in the same way as it did when Heath called an election on his leadership in '74 (despite the unpopularity of the Labour Party at the time). It's not that I don't think Corbyn has a chance of winning next time, I think he has, but I think he'll come under a lot more fire now that it's clear that he could be Prime Minister.

[ViaActiva]

I don't think saying that there's violence on all sides in a war is misleading or even newsworthy..

September 1939: Hitler invades Poland.

Do you think Chamberlain said that 'there was violence on all sides'!?!

[ViaActiva]

My point is that Corbyn's constant refrain of condemning violence of all sides is a form of moral equivalence that basically absolves the international community of any responsibility (like 'I condemn all forms of racism including antisemitism'). I agree that the situation is perhaps less morally absolute than the Second World War, but there's hardly moral equivalence between each side in Syria when the ruling state has just literally gassed innocent children to death (not for the first time) despite repeated warnings.

There is at least a clear rationale for unequivocally condemning Assad's actions (we can debate the pros and cons of intervention) rather than Corbyn's mealy mouthed language 'they're just as bad as each other' which is basically doing Assad and Russia's job for them.