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Indeed many EU governments are now using the language of the far-right with regards to "taking back control” of immigration.
Yes, they are. This is going on worldwide right now. Those EU governments are limited as to who and how they can "make an example of foreigners" in a way ours (current and future) are not. Those limits are far from a total safeguard, and they look to be being pressed and reduced in years to come... but our governments now have fewer of such restraints. If we pull out of the ECHR as Badenoch and Farage have promised, which EU governments can't do, it'll be fewer still.
Kemi Badenoch is simply mimicking Nigel Farage for exactly the same reason as Sir Keir Starmer is attempting to.
Yup... but it has nothing to do with Brexit, right? Brexit was a step along this journey. Those who have loudly proclaimed that Labour need to "accept Brexit" and deliver on its promises have moved Labour to where it is now. Badenoch and Farage going far further still of course. All three now competing to place themselves somewhere where they can be seen to keep out more foreigners. The next step is about removing people who have lived and worked here for ages... Badenoch, Jenrick and Farage are already pushing this line.
anyway that picture of Jenrick with his judges wig reminded me of someone...
Honest Bob just continuing with his Faragist leadership bid.
He's about to give his speech, where I expect he’ll go full Tommy Robinson
The corrupt tosser who approved building in a world heritage protection zone after payment to the Party coffers. So no surprise.
Yup... but it has nothing to do with Brexit, right?
The far-right, conservatives, and centrists, right across Europe are churning out this "taking back control of immigration" bollocks, whether they support EU membership or not.
You don't hear the same shite from the Left, whether they support EU membership or not.
So yeah, the comment in the ITVX article is perfectly reasonable, Starmer is indeed adopting the language of the far-right, as is Badenoch.
The conservative and centrist response to the rise of the far-right is to adopt their language, a futile tactic which has been proven time and again not to work. It is because they cannot bring themselves to offer the radical alternatives which the Left suggests.
Plus let's be honest, they are much more comfortable embracing bigotry and racism than they should be, it's not such a big deal for them. As the Forde Report into racism in the Labour Party discovered.
Frexit hasn't happened and yet :
https://www.euractiv.com/news/french-government-to-propose-tougher-immigration-laws-in-2025/
So according to a man being touted as possibly the next leader of the Conservative Party Reform UK is "well to the left" of Jeremy Corbyn :
https://www.channel4.com/news/reforms-economic-policies-are-left-of-corbyn-says-senior-tory
James Cleverly: We are the party, remember, who in the House of Commons started to really push down on the welfare budget whilst we’re in government. We campaigned for it in opposition. Reform supported increased welfare spending. They’re supporting the scrapping of the two-child benefit. That will push the welfare bill even higher and taxes even higher, and that’s a position well to the left of even Jeremy Corbyn.
James Cleverly: Yeah, so on economic policies, they are well to the left of Corbyn. That is not Conservatism, it is not tenable, and it would not be of good service to the British people.
I am not sure if being well to the left of Corbyn makes Corbyn far-right, or whether makes Reform even more far-left than Corbyn.
And I wasn't aware that supporting scrapping of the two-child benefits cap made anyone well to the left of Corbyn, I am fairly sure that Corbyn also supports scrapping the two-child benefits cap.
I am also sure that James Cleverly talking complete shite shows the contempt he has for the intelligence of punters, he should come on here!
40 years ago talk of deporting foreigners claiming benefits would have been the preserve of the National Front, who could have predicted that one day a black leader of the Tory Party would come out with neo-nazi shite like that?
Or maybe Binners isn't very observant, that could be it?Has anyone ever actually seen anyone wearing a full burka in the UK? I lived in a predominantly Asian/Muslim area for years and I haven’t
Yes. Next question.
Well I guess that the next obvious question is are you absolutely certain that you know what a full burka actually means?
On Saturday I will be attending a demo which is likely to have the highest concentration of Muslim women in public, and in one place, in the UK, I don't expect to see one single woman in a full burka.
But anyway even if in the extraordinarily unlikely event that I do see a woman in a full burka I think we can safely say that it is extremely rare and not actually representative of the reality of life in the UK.
Which I believe was binners point.
I lived in or near Bradford, Leicester, Birmingham, Coventry and Derby at various points during my time in the UK, i'd see someone in a Niqab pretty much daily in some of those cities and a Burka a couple of times a month. Since i've moved to Sweden, i see them more often. But i live not far from one of Swedens "no go zones" (according to the daily fail). I go there on a regular basis.
I would consider myself very observant and I don't recall ever seeing a woman wearing a full burka in the UK.
The niqab I see all the time. In fact there is something interesting that I have observed on nearly 30 national demos in support of Palestine that I have been on in the last couple of years.
The demos obviously represent a huge concentration of Muslims and in the early ones niqabs were rarely seen but as time has progressed they have become more and more prevalent.
The reason for this? I have no doubt that it is because the huge pro-Palestine demos are seen as a safe non threatening place for Muslim women to be themselves. A Muslim woman on her own (or with a child or friend) is highly likely to be harassed on the streets of London but there is no chance that they will be on one of the huge demos surrounded by supportive people.
I have sat in Whitehall (on that grassy bit) eating a sandwich literally surrounded by Muslim women doing their prayers (awkward because men aren't supposed to see) They did so because they felt it was a safe place for them.
I have seen groups of Muslim women get off the train at Victoria Station before a demo and pull out Palestinian keffiyehs and other stuff from their bags to wear because the sea of visible Palestinian flags makes them feel safe to do so.
Never underestimate how vulnerable and intimidated Muslim women can feel in the streets of the UK.
Women wearing the niqab are a very common sight on the trains around here. I can't remember when I last saw a burka. Perhaps 20 years ago?
It'll be interesting to see how Kemi explains this one.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn095n9qd87o
surely the Brexit point was succinctly summed up by Stewart Lee.. "not everyone who voted for Brexit was racist but every racist voted for Brexit"
it remains the greatest victory the far right has had in this country in my lifetime, hopefully they'll not better it, but it certainly has shifted the overton window
Anyway Badenoch is 355 days or so into her 1 years grace period, however I missed that last year the Tories changed their rules so now 1/3rd of MPs -40 , are needed to trigger a leadership vote rather that 15% as was and that would have only needed 18 letters.
Im guessing she's safe for now....
Chris Philp on Kuensberg this morning was quite specific that he wouldn't actually call the racist comments on adverts by that mad Reform woman racist. Wes Streeting was, for all his many faults, quite definite that her nonsense was racist. Quite a useful line to take to expose the Tories at the moment
Chris Philp is spectacularly stupid, but then so is everyone presently in the rotting corpse of the Tory party.
Not one of them will say a single word that would separate them from Reform. They certainly won’t condemn Reforms flagrant racism and the inevitable next leader of the Tory party, Honest Bob, is busy trying to make Nigel Farage look like Jeremy Corbyn
it remains the greatest victory the far right has had in this country in my lifetime,
I’ve got issues with this. Corbyn,amongst others, didnt like the EU, he didnt campaign to leave, but he probably would have done if he was still a backbencher, and , he could hardly be called the ‘far right’. The Brexit vote was won by people with many different political views, and certainly not due to the ‘far right’, as many of those who voted to leave would characterise themselves as neither left or right, and even if the ‘far right’ had wanted this result, it was those of of many political views rather than just the right that won the vote.
surely the Brexit point was succinctly summed up by Stewart Lee.. "not everyone who voted for Brexit was racist but every racist voted for Brexit"
Not really. Plenty of racists, especially Tory Party racists, saw integration with Europe, and immigrants from white Christian European countries rather than black/brown African/West Indian/Muslim countries, as preferable.
Personally I think that as Europe plunges further and further into the arms of the far-right Nigel Farage will increasingly regret not being part of that.
There are plenty of racists in Europe who support EU membership, most in fact.
Stewart Lee is very funny, and clever, but being stuck in a middle-class liberal bubble, something which I suspect he would freely admit, sometimes talks bollocks.
Brexit vote was won by people with many different political views, and certainly not due to the ‘far right’
i said a victory for the far right rather than by, (though im sure Farage would say it was won by him)
tommy ten names and co were more than happy to be seen as the defenders of Brexit
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-46495595
im sure plenty of people voting for Brexit didn't realise they were going to be providing such an opportunity for the far right
but at the same time it was pretty hard to miss the racism at the core of the brexiteer's messaging
to get vaguely back on topic, the irony of Cameron thinking it would settle the debate within the party , only to find that it would consume the conservatives as they chase reform ever farther to the right
it will be interesting to see how Badenoch responds to the questions on Lams ethnic cleansing policies
im sure plenty of people voting for Brexit didn't realise they were going to be providing such an opportunity for the far right
Brexit didn't provide the far-right with any great opportunities, it was the failures of first the Tory Party and then the Labour Party which gave the far-right such an opportunity in the UK.
In the 2015 general election UKIP received 12.6% of the vote, in the 2017 general election, a year after the referendum, UKIP collapsed and they received just 1.8% of the vote.
It took Nigel Farage 30 years, 7 general elections, and 2 by-elections, for him to win his first Westminster seat in 2024. What changed Nigel Farage's fortunes was the collapse in support for the Tories which was initially triggered by Liz Truss's disastrous premiership.
In the 2024 general election Reform received 14% of the vote due to the Tory government, now their support has more than doubled thanks to a "Labour" government.
The far-right are on the march throughout the EU for very similar reasons that they are in the UK.....the failure of the neoliberal experiment and the complete lack of credibility in the establishment parties which have backed it.
Yup, no direct line at all between convincing half of voters to support leaving the EU, and normalising Farage and his policies in the UK. Non at all.
🤐
Mainstreaming Brexit has mainstreamed Farage. He has had to keep dumping parties to keep up the pretence of being the new political force set against the “failure of the old political parties”, but they’re all just vehicles for him and his “Breaking Point” politics. I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up as leader of yet another party before the decade is out, when this one looks to be losing support (and its appeal). But draw a line through his course from being seen as a dangerous outsider to a real contender to run the UK… and it goes straight through the Leave campaigns and our eventual abandonment of the EU.
the pretence of being the new political force set against the “failure of the old political parties”
So you agree with me that his selling point is that he doesn't represent the discredited establishment parties. A selling point which has brought Farage huge rewards by first the failures of a Tory government then secondly, and even more so, the failures of a Labour government. Jolly good
.
convincing half of voters to support leaving the EU
You give Farage way too much credit, he couldn't even convince voters to back UKIP in the 2017 general election after the referendum, well only 1.8% bothered backing his party. And it took him 30 years to find enough voters who would back his repeated and desperate attempts to secure a Westminster seat.
There is a reason that Farage was not allowed to be part of the the official cross-party Leave campaign and he had to lead his own smaller separate UKIP campaign.....he was seen as too toxic by the official Leave campaign, certainly with regards to non-UKIP voters.
But you big it for Farage and claim that through his apparent incredible power of persuasion he managed to convince half of voters to vote in a way they would not have otherwise done.
I can see that it might effectively, at least you presumably hope, deflect from the fact that Sir Keir Starmer is the gift to Nigel Farage who keeps on giving and who has practically guaranteed that Farage will become Prime Minister in less than 4 years time.
So it's all the fault of Brexit and nothing to do Starmer at all that Reform have been leading every single opinion poll since mid-April. It might be bollocks but what else is a centrist supposed to say?
I don’t “big it for Farage”, I just don’t pretend his current success is divorced from Brexit.
I think giving Nigel Farage personal credit for how half of voters voted in a campaign which he didn't even front (Boris Johnson did) is bigging it up for him.
And yes you like to pretend that Reform's unprecedented support is not connected to collapse in support first for the Tories and now for Labour.
Perhaps you can explain why Labour won a landslide victory 15 months ago and not Reform?
And also maybe why Nigel Farage's party only won 1.8% of the vote, and not one single seat, in the general election following the referendum?
I look forward to your undoubtedly interesting answers to those two questions !
I thought your answers to those two questions might have been a tad more interesting, but hey, not easy questions to answer, I guess, if you have been making the case for Nigel Farage's alleged huge powers of persuasion.
Where's the Badenoch madness?
Ooh I can answer that.......someone decided to derail the thread and start banging on about Brexit, yet again. Apparently everything is down to Brexit.
But there is nothing to stop you bringing the thread firmly back on track and discussing the Badenoch madness without banging on about Brexit, if you can manage that.
Where's the Badenoch madness?
Who knows? I don’t think anyone’s heard from her lately. Unlike Honest Bob, who’s everywhere, as usual. It’s like she’s conceded the leadership to him already in leu of the inevitable.
There were a number of Meedya commentators on the radio the other day all saying how little she engages with any of them. She seems to think she’s above that sort of thing.
One said that those who ‘work’ with her says she only has two settings… lazy or angry. She’s like Boris in that she doesn’t listen to anyone, can’t be arsed reading her briefs and just wings it, normally through getting ineffectually shouty
This explains why, even with everything that’s going on, Starmer just swats her aside every week at PMQS and when conducting polling recently, loads of people didn’t know who she was
She’s already forgotten, before she’s gone. There’s a higher chance of Farage leading the Conservative Party into the next general election than her getting to do so.
Whole I'm no fan of Reeves in Kemi's world hacking is less serious than being mislead by 3rd party advice...
And yet according to the article the maximum sentence for the criminal offence which Kemi Badenoch committed is two years imprisonment whilst I don't believe a custodial sentence is available for Rachel Reeve's crime.
And yet according to the article the maximum sentence for the criminal offence which Kemi Badenoch committed is two years imprisonment whilst I don't believe a custodial sentence is available for Rachel Reeve's crime.
Strange that among the various recent dodgy arrangements the Press have stopped talking about Farages house purchase
her inability to accept she made a mistake is quite something
https://bsky.app/profile/psurridge.bsky.social/post/3m6ouqiai222g
I would just like to extend a warm welcome to the continuing implosion of the tory party, 2026 edition. Long may it continue
Also: roffle
I would just like to extend a warm welcome to the continuing implosion of the tory party, 2026 edition. Long may it continue
Whilst I wholeheartedly agree, it should be observed that implosion of Tory seems to = growth of Reform. So be careful what you wish for.
well, I also wish for everyone in the reform party, and all its supporters and voters, to each fall down an open manhole into a sewer, if that's any help?
genuine quiestion, at what point does the Tory party ceased to exist and all RW voters just flip to Refuk?
As much as I enjoy watching Badenoch repeatedly trip over her own feet I reckon she deserves credit for this one as by stealing Honest Bob's thunder it prevents us having to watch that worm gurning next to the man frog in a press conference, looking all pleased with himself.
genuine quiestion, at what point does the Tory party ceased to exist and all RW voters just flip to Refuk?
Looking at the polls reform have seen a recent dip and the Tories have been the main one to benefit. These defections have shown Reform as the Tory reject party (which is a pretty low place to be). Small numbers though, so not exactly emphatic
Ill bet Jenrick is genuinely seething
I wonder what its like being a defector and having to see your former colleagues in parliament
and yep hes defected to reform,
As much as I enjoy watching Badenoch repeatedly trip over her own feet I reckon she deserves credit for this one as by stealing Honest Bob's thunder it prevents us having to watch that worm gurning next to the man frog in a press conference, looking all pleased with himself.
Unfortunately, nothing can prevent that. But even for a slimy little worm like him, who always looks insufferably smug, he must know that the entire country is pissing themselves laughing at him, surely? Actually... that would require a level of self-awreness and he's up there with Liz Truss on that score
Nige doesn't give a toss, obviously. Its all just more attention for him and he'll cast Honest Bob aside without a second thought when it suits him
Its all just more attention for him and he'll cast Honest Bob aside without a second thought when it suits him
Speaking of which since reform seems to operate an one defecting mp in one mp quits in a huff which one of them is going?
They’re all such thoroughly unpleasant, not to mention self-absorbed people, as more of the Tory rejects crowd into the Reform tent, I can’t see it remaining harmonious for very long.
It’s so transparent that Honest Bob wants (and thinks he deserves) the top job, I can’t see him and the man-frogs marriage of convenience lasting very long. And only one person is going to come out on top there.
So, in answer to your question I reckon Honest Bob will be last in, first out @dissonance. He’ll be sitting as an independent in no time, which will supply us all with even more hilarity, I’m sure
Honest Bob was scathing about former colleagues Mel Stride and the Pritsik so his judgement can't be completely misplaced, unlike his morals and humanity.