Delighted to help and all that.
All to do with perching - Passerines perch. Swifts notorious for not coming to earth except for the whole egg laying scenario.
It’s just so unlikely to happen, yet they still keep making these fake videos?! Madness.
I can only assume they do it for one reason: it works. It's a bit like phishing emails, your immediate reaction may well be "how can anyone fall for this shit?" but people demonstrably do or they wouldn't exist.
For all their failings, the Right has - and has had for some time now - a considerably better marketing / PR clout than the Left. We saw this in 2016, Remain appealed to the head and Leave appealed to the heart. With the benefit of hindsight, the heart was always going to win, you can rock up with all the facts you like but changing feelings is near-impossible. We were so smug, up to and including Callmedave himself, that no-one would actually be stupid enough to actually vote in favour of this. Yet almost a decade on (jesus, really?) we have learned nothing from that debacle.
"Reform UK" is a masterstroke, the dingles round here will vote for that in droves because it's shit right now so reform sounds like a good idea, right? Throw in an implied side order of sending Them back where they came form, there will be a scrum at the polling booth doors.
The Tories win. Reform win. UKIP win. Leave.EU win. Again and again. And the reason for this is, as we bask in our self-righteous aura of intellectual superiority, we cannot countenance the notion that they will. Again and again. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
I get where you’re coming from, and it would be fantastic for that to happen (although very unlikely), but in terms of importance I think it’s way behind what Labour actually do once they are in power.
I think the two things are linked. If Tories are eliminated as a threat then a Labour govt would be able to do more progressive or radical stuff with less fear of losing out at the following GE.
And the reason for this is, as we bask in our self-righteous aura of intellectual superiority, we cannot countenance the notion that they will. Again and again
This is a good point and reminds me of the Grayson Perry road trip in America where he tried to raise the possibility that the intellectual elite had played a part in the rise of trump.
great website here with breakdown of all the latest MRPs with constituency breakdown
it actually looks worse for the Tories than I thought
https://inglesp.github.io/apogee/
The Tories win. Reform win. UKIP win. Leave.EU win. Again and again. And the reason for this is, as we bask in our self-righteous aura of intellectual superiority, we cannot countenance the notion that they will. Again and again. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
I'll quote you a it leads me into what I'm going to say though I am not inferring you mean the same as my comment below. 👍
We need to fight these **** where they reside, in the gutter. Being the "better person" and "winning the moral argument" are for yesterday's politics. I wish it wasn't this way but it is.
kimbers
Full Member
great website here with breakdown of all the latest MRPs with constituency breakdownit actually looks worse for the Tories than I thought
https://inglesp.github.io/apogee/
/blockquote>
According to that, my incumbent Tory is behind on Every. Single. Poll!The Reform vote has done for her and Labour, hopefully, will win.
Finally, the useful idiots in the UK are doing something productive! 😁
(I know, I'm a bad, bad person.)
We need to fight these * where they reside, in the gutter. Being the “better person” and “winning the moral argument” are for yesterday’s politics. I wish it wasn’t this way but it is.
As much as it pains me to say it, dazh was right on one thing. You don't win votes from *ing morons with an opening gambit of "well, you're a ****ing moron." Even if they are. Dunning-Kruger would tell us that even if we point it out, they're not going to go "OMG, I had no idea, thanks for the info!"
We - I - had a hard lesson here during the run-up to and aftermath thereof of the referendum. Going "well, actually, I think you'll find..." changes no minds. To the hard of thinking you just sound like Mr Logic out of Viz. And Viz's own tagline - one of the more repeatable ones in polite company - was "he's a pain in the arse."
There is a square we cannot circle in that if you want better things, we need higher taxes; if you want lower taxes, we get fewer nice things. Sunak weaponised this hand over fist last night, the best thing Starmer could have done is offer a free lollipop for everyone.
Do we really need to raise more taxes though? Or could we just be more efficient with what we already raise?
And you can’t credit the lack of populists in scotland to having PR. That’s a result of the fact that Scottish nationalists are already in power and already doing most of what a populist nationalistic govt would do. There’s a lot more going on in Scotland than simply having PR.
This is complete cobblers. At last TJ and I agree about something!
It also doesn't explain why the "Scottish phenomenon" has also been seen in Wales, and Northern Ireland, and London, which all have PR.
That website has only ELEVEN constituencies predicted as conservative by ALL polls. 30 have at least one poll predicting Reform. Mine (Windsor) looks too close to call with medians of 32% Con and 28% Lab. A few more Con2Ref and Lib2Lab and it's all to play for! In a previously very safe seat. Pity you can't weight the sampling in the surveys for an overall result. Nice coding though.
Median predicted conservative seats is 107, fewer than my 120. Shy Tory effect has to be factored in. I think I am safe 😀
Take off the highest and lowest seat prediction of those polls and the average is just 98 seats…That’s bonkers.
This is how I'd roughly got to my current guestimate for Tory seats. Problem is, when you actually see it in black and white, it suddenly becomes ridiculous.
Some of the SNP predictions are woeful, and I find hard to believe. But there goes my inner bias ignoring the data in front of me.
It's fascinating, to put it mildly
Ta PCA We agree on a few things - like trying to understand and being truthful as we can. I did spot you even giving credit to the Scots Gov the other day - I nearly fell off my chair 🙂
Do we really need to raise more taxes though? Or could we just be more efficient with what we already raise?
Not really - the squeeze has a been so tight for so long that there is not a lot of efficiency savings to be made. Stopping the privitisation of things would help of course and the bribes and corruption
the other alternative is to run a bigger deficit. Rone gets the piss taken out of him for the magic money tree but by my understanding conventional Keynes would suggest a spending boost is needed now.
I really do not see the tories falling to below a hundred seats - MY guess is 200. But i would be delighted if it happened.
I really do not see the tories falling to below a hundred seats – MY guess is 200. But i would be delighted if it happened.
I know TJ, but look at the data. Where are they coming from? It's giddying!
The locals polling was broadly correct I believe? In which case.....
“Some of the SNP predictions are woeful, and I find hard to believe.”
I think it about right, Labour will be taking many of their seats next week. They’ve lost lots of support in the last 2 years, so the robust Nationalists are the only ones who are goong to vote for them, thats around 35% I’d guess at, there others who want Independence, but dont support the SNP, Alba, obviously, but there are Tory and Labour voters who want Independence, but cannot vote for the SNP for varying reasons. And, the Tory vote is likely to increase in Scotland, against the UK trend.
thing with the SNP seats is the variation is huge. I suspect many of the polls are not granular enough. On the previous page the range was 8 - 40 or something.
Labour will do very well to become the largest party I*MO - although its clear SNP will lose seats MY guess is that the SNP and labour will end up in the high 20s each.
I don't think the tory vote will rise - but they might gain seats from the SNP and Labour splitting the anti tory vote
Do we really need to raise more taxes though?
At the risk of bringing up MMT again, no we don't. What we need to do is have the political will to do something because it's in the common interest, then we create (or borrow, to use the bullshit fantasy term everyone seems to accept) the money to do it. At some point in the future we'll need to tax that money back if it looks like it's going to cause inflationary pressures, and it's at that point we can have a debate about who we should tax. For now all the govt needs to decide is what things they want to improve with the labour resources they have at their disposal.
As much as it pains me to say it, dazh was right on one thing. You don’t win votes from *ing morons with an opening gambit of “well, you’re a *ing moron.”
So after handing them the keys to the asylum 8 years back, changing a whole country's foreign and domestic policy to appease them, what do we do?
It's also worth remembering that they think we are the ****** morons. I'm really not happy with pandering to them for another decade but I'm totally open to new ideas on his to deal with them.
the other alternative is to run a bigger deficit. Rone gets the piss taken out of him for the magic money tree but by my understanding conventional Keynes would suggest a spending boost is needed now.
They need to spend to generate growth (part of the UK's poor productivity compared to our neighbours is F all investment in roads, railways, schools, health etc in most of the country since 2010). However, Labour are also saying they won't spend if the growth isn't already there to support it. It's like saying you're applying for jobs that need a degree/Masters/professional qualification and once you get the job you'll use the wages to start studying.
As per a few pages ago, hopefully they're lying (strange thing to say but it's better than the alternative) and will do a "well we didn't know how bad it was, we need to spend some money to fix the Tory mess" once they're in power. 5 more years of austerity won't stop the lurch rightwards when people see that things aren't getting better for them, especially if the Tory party has basically evaporated.
And for the record, I would love to see the Tories reduced to single digit seats, I just don't want their voters from 2010-2019 all going to Reform instead!
What we need to do is have the political will to do something because it’s in the common interest, then we create (or borrow, to use the bullshit fantasy term everyone seems to accept) the money to do it. At some point in the future we’ll need to tax that money back if it looks like it’s going to cause inflationary pressures
I don't see how it won't cause inflationary pressures, the markets will definitely react and we've seen that a weaker £ doesn't increase exports as it puts up input costs.
That's not too say that I don't think we shouldn't be borrowing, especially if it's genuinely to invest in infrastructure & services that will help, but there's a very good reason Labour are tio toeing around fiscal rules
Truss showed how quickly things can spiral out of hand if you the markets think you're being reckless
I take the piss out of Rone for constantly bringing it up, not for the actual content. I'm not an economist and IDK whether it is correct or not, but I can follow the logic. The issue I have is that with the investment in skills and training we have had, and the current job and labour supply market, if we were to decide to pump investment in would we actually have the right quantity and quality of labour to deliver it. Sure, we can throw money at thousands of new doctors and nurses and build new hospitals, but WHO will actually do this? It's a long term play at least not a tap that can be turned on.
And so to the second point.
Do we really need to raise more taxes though? Or could we just be more efficient with what we already raise?
I'm sure there are efficiency savings to be had but these aren't easy. Even if you can spot them and point at them easily, to actually implement - we don't have a good record, we always overspend and run into issues, and even done right there's often a short term hump for a longer term improvement. Redundancy payments for example, if we were to get rid of swathes of middle managers. Doesn't mean they shouldn't pursue but again the issue is in just under 5 years' time, if not sooner, we'll be poring over the spending and waiting lists and..... deciding if we want to give them another term.
Companies linked to Tory donors given £8.4bn in public contracts since 2016
And yet... now theres an election on tory donors seem to have trouble reaching their pockets. Having raised the spend threshold for campaigning for £20m to £35m they now don't seem to be able to attract any cash. Labour raised £4.4m just in one week at the start of the campaign - in the same week the Tories £290,000.
Its almost like no-one want to back a loser.
Where are they coming from? It’s giddying!
Plenty of seats where Tory voters will turn out next week against expectations, and others will not bother, or will vote to make a point rather than help choose their MP. And I’m not talking about “shy tories”, or the polls getting it wrong, I’m talking about people who in recent weeks say they either don’t know how they’ll vote, or if they’ll vote, or who change their mind about who to vote for at the last minute.
even done right there’s often a short term hump for a longer term improvement. Redundancy payments for example, if we were to get rid of swathes of middle managers.
*Sigh*. This is one regularly aimed at the NHS and it's just plain wrong. It's likely to be a false economy as if you get rid of your procurement managers then you have doctors and nurses trying to check, sign and enforce contracts with suppliers. If you get rid of payroll managers you make more mistakes so either overpay people with public money, or struggle to recruit as people don't get paid on time. If you get rid of operational managers then, again, clinical staff have to fill the gap. Who shall we have to manage Freedom of Information Act requests? An information governance manager? Nah, let's get one of the cleaners to do it. And now you're being sued because something that shouldn't have been shared was, and it shows that the nurse who had to do the procurement for a multimillion £ contract didn't follow the right process (because they're not an expert on that). Or maybe a patient is harmed by a faulty piece of equipment because the maintenance schedule was done by a medical equipment manager.
Absolutely hold people to account and expect them to do a good job, but give them the skills and tools to do a good job (that means £). And don't assume that anyone not on the 'front line' is a waste of money and can therefore be sacked with no downsides. I'm under no illusions that the NHS is perfect and there's not a single person wasting a single second, but big organisations need management, that's just a fact. If anything we need more project managers etc (at least temporarily) in big public sector bodies to help implement the changes that will make them more efficient.
Truss showed how quickly things can spiral out of hand if you the markets think you’re being reckless
To me with respect there's no line of logic here. The idea being we can't do certain things just because of the markets is nonsense.
That situation could have been resolved immediately if the BoE had bought bonds and/or been in proper communication.
I've linked to you before detailed information about it - not to mention the leverage in the pensions system. The markets themselves are the problem and when they wobble the government has to step on a fix it. The government enables markets.
We need to stop worrying about currency rates too. They go up and down all the time. And up until recently by way of example the dollar was super strong despite trillions of US government investment. So spending on the right things will almost certainly strengthen your currency.
That’s not too say that I don’t think we shouldn’t be borrowing, especially if it’s genuinely to invest in infrastructure & services that will help, but there’s a very good reason Labour are tio toeing around fiscal rules
Those fiscal rules are imaginary . They're not based on anything and will almost certainly be altered when in power. They're self-imposed and fiscally irresponsible.
A currency issuing government does not borrow what it creates. Why would it need to? Issuing bonds has nothing whatsoever to do with the ability to spend.
To do the thing Labour needs to do; to make a difference and improve society - it will need to spend massively, and on the correct things.
And the markets will have to deal with it.
The markets will be the least of our problems.
Or could we just be more efficient with what we already raise?
This is thrown around by everyone who doesn't want to pay tax, but it's a fairly pointless idea to cling to. I mean, imagine doing a full audit of everything in the public sector, analysing it for every instance of inefficiency, and then having the inevitable argument about what's important and what's not.
Of course there are inefficiencies, as there are everywhere, but usually 'efficiency savings' is just a way to force cuts on departments that are then forced to deny services, or it's used as a political football.
The real efficiency savings would be from making everyone do their jobs more effectively through stuff like better use of IT, which means education not cuts.
It’s also worth remembering that they think we are the ****** morons. I’m really not happy with pandering to them for another decade but I’m totally open to new ideas on his to deal with them
It's funny isn't it how two generations of ****s have voted, decade after decade for falling behind, stunted growth and lack of progress based upon recommendations by the RW press. Their well nurtured ideological leanings have delivered a UK that has barely moved on from many of the problems from the 70's. Even Spain a country these ****s used to mock as backward is more modern and better run than the UK.
It's very big of them to mock anyone younger than them as naïve and absolve themselves of responsibility their ideological leanings have delivered by saying they have been lied to/it's just a personnel problem.
Rone gets the piss taken out of him for the magic money tree but by my understanding conventional Keynes would suggest a spending boost is needed now.
Because there is no other way. No growth without big government spending. It's more or less impossible which is why Starmer and Reeves are delusional by saying they want to grow the economy and have fiscal rules at the same time. I guarantee you it will not work without loosening of one or the other.
(How do you a fill a bath without turning the taps on?)
And things need fixing. So inflation will only be an issue if we don't resource it properly. And taxation would fix that.
We need the resources and the labour to do it. The money is the easy part.
Taxes never pay for spending in central Government. History shows you where taxes came from and they weren't to pay for things. They were derived from the burning of tally sticks so the 'currency' couldn't be reused.
Taxes are modern day equivalent of burning money.
Starmer and Reeves are delusional by saying they want to grow the economy and have fiscal rules at the same time.
I'm fairly confident they have a plan to spend whilst being able to deny that they've done it - or excuse it.
And they also have to realise the candidate answers to them first and foremost and not their party.
It would be nice if that was a fact.
Channel 4 News have carried out an undercover sting on Farage's Clacton team!
And it's not good, not good at all...
https://twitter.com/Channel4News/status/1806374007521849668
Take off the highest and lowest seat prediction of those polls and the average is just 98 seats…That’s bonkers.
The FT model uses a selection of polls and their current prediction for the Tories is 101 seats. It's also worth looking at FT model explained. The various polls used predict from 53 to 185 seats for the Tories (!) and none are predicting Libdem forming the official opposition (shame). Though the last paragraph on that page gives some hope.
"Were the Conservatives to fall 5 points to 16 per cent, our model would give them just 18 seats. Such a result is not unheard of in a first-past-the-post system; in Canada in 1993, the ruling Progressive Conservative party collapsed to 16 per cent of the national vote and mustered just two seats".
Oh and you can check out the predicted swings for any constituency on that page too.
ignore
I don’t see how it won’t cause inflationary pressures,
It will at some point. ~Where that point is depends if you believe in MMT or keynes. But when you have a flatlining economy then there is certainly a gap between turning the taps on and getting significant inflation.
Trusses problem was the money was being thrown away not used to build stuff
I’m fairly confident they have a plan to spend whilst being able to deny that they’ve done it – or excuse it.
Whereas I am confident they do not. Reeves is a very conventional economist. I think yo are guilty of wishful thinking
@bails, I agree, was not saying it's what should be done. Just that IF it was, and it always comes up for sure, it's not an instant fix, there's a hump of spending and further inefficiency at least at first and if there's a 5 year window to make it pay back, that's no easy thing.
Totally agree on all the downsides - as a perpetual back office worker all my life, it galls when people denigrate the roles without thinking properly what impact is on front line services if they're all having to chase the late delivery of urgent kit, etc.
The main inefficiency in the NHS is the tories fake market creating all sorts of unneeded tiers of admin. Scotland has around half the admin costs of England - because we no longer have it ( yes I know its been modified in England but it still has layers that just do not exist in Scotland) The NHS remains a highly efficient organisation with usually too little and too poor management. Getting rid of pen pushers will not help as above
