ForenSix Opposition - Politics in the Soon To Be Former UK in Autumn 2020

meanwhile, i see that prof john edmunds has told the science and health select committee that there's no way we're getting out of this wave of the rona without tens of thousands of deaths, which seems like the kind of thing that a government should probably be held to account for unless lol nothing matters

those Tory numbers don't look drastically different to what you'd expect from the perma-Tories plus maybe a bit of "support the government during a national crisis" thing. the failure is all Labour's

i'm vaguely surprised that support for labour is as high as it is tbh

savantacom res might be an outlier, but I bet Keith will be sweating on those other polls dropping over the next few days. He might need to start thinking about his leadership style, or just resign and then take up some nice hobbies like tombstoning or drunken skiing

hell of an achievement to lose three points of support while facing off against the most patently incompetent government the uk has had in living memory, which is quite an achievement in itself considering the last decade of tory rule

Meanwhile in the House of Lords

Sadly inevitable vote result with Labour abstention

Amendment for rights of UK citizens to live with EU spouses/partners and children in own country lost 168-254.

— Natalie Bennett (@natalieben) October 21, 2020

wt actual f?

They heard December’s message from the electorate loud and clear, I guess. I keep thinking about that twitter thread about the problem with Corbyn being that he valued the lives of people who weren’t white and/or British, and it keeps feeling truer all the time.

there's no other reason to abstain is there?

this fucking country

meanwhile, we don't oppose for the sake of it

I had to take my toddler for a COVID test earlier this week - it was a depressing and deeply infuriating insight into just how incompetent and *blatantly* corrupt the UK's out-sourced testing set-up is.

— Louis (@Louis_Allday) October 21, 2020

I think that amendment being defeated means it’s officially a right lost- like I, an EU citizen, have the right to live in any of the 27 & my British spouse can come with and mooch off my citizenship? Is that right?

Cementing this as a right would basically create a two-tier system where EU spouses could live in the UK without meeting further requirements but non-EU spouses would still have to go through income checks, etc aiui.

wrt the poll, it'd be interesting to see national polling on Burnham's position specifically. I have no idea whether it's a net negative for the government to be picking these fights.

just heard some Barnsley sounding female vox pop on R4 "at least we aren't holding the govt to ransom like Manchester are.."

I can’t remember who said it but around the time of the last election someone pointed out how much British politics is driven by resentment towards the nearest town or city slightly bigger than yours.

i believe that was sigmund freud

3pt gain for having a pop at Manchester and hitting 209 deaths/day then

26,688 positive cases today lads, fucking thrilled

3% is pretty standard margin of error stuff tbh.

I heard radio woman as well but heard it as "at least we aren't being held to ransom like Manchester"

Oh right. Always good to hear they are happy with their lot in Barnsley!

Ludicrous.

NEW: On the 'scum' comment directed towards Tory MP Chris Clarkson, Angela Rayner said: "I apologise for the language that I used in a heated debate in parliament earlier."

— Sienna Rodgers (@siennamarla) October 21, 2020

Such offensive language in the mother of all parliaments, begad! What was she thinking about

Ha, no guarantee I am correct, I was on my way out at the time.

And waiting for me downstairs was another Tory mail-out, this time complaining about sadiq's congestion charge, or London tax, as they are calling it, and the closing of Hammersmith bridge, which is also sadiq's fault.

no question she's been told to apologise

She was never going to be the attention seeking vain knobhead tha Watson was as a deputy leader. But I think Starmer both doesn't like nor trust her and is doing his upmost to marginalise her for the time being. She now might realise what a dream boss the "IRA twat" was!

Everyone knows feeding hungry children is a top priority. I'd like to see UC boosted.

But if the economy and currency collapse, the poor will be devastated.

To go from feed 1 in 9 kids at Christmas to currency collapse is some sensationalist bullshit when you've managed to pay for half the country to have a fucking nandos every Tuesday night for a month.

Difficult to see why any once currency would collapse when the entire rich world is both borrowing and printing gigantic sums of money.

The UK doing that while simultaneously creating a sudden and acute shortage of goods via a No Deal Brexit might do it though.

Brutal week. Even if the polling went 10% lower the mandate is four years.

astonishing how many lives Tory MPs have voted to ruin this week alone, out of sheer spite. And it's only Wednesday pic.twitter.com/gwnXQNgcdk

— tom (@malaiseforever) October 21, 2020

God, when you see it laid out like that...

Meanwhile this thread might answer at least some of ShariVari's question upthread.

On the Manchester showdown, Brits think Andy Burnham and Boris Johnson are driven by...

Burnham: 38% interests of Manchester / 35% party politics
Johnson: 33% interests of the country / 38% party politicshttps://t.co/WZTRu8en8g pic.twitter.com/eWvyNoGodh

— YouGov (@YouGov) October 21, 2020

The Scottish and Welsh governments have pledged to extend free school meals over the holidays up to and including Easter 2021. English pupils will be the outlier in Great Britain.

— Lewis Goodall (@lewis_goodall) October 21, 2020

Waiting for YouGov poll to show 78% of over-70s blame the parents

Repetitive beats is it

What does section 63 of the CJPOA 1994 say?

It’s the definition of an “outdoor rave” which has been carried across.

Needs to involve amplified music which “is likely to cause series distress to the inhabitants of the locality”https://t.co/RjoHymkS6m pic.twitter.com/xcz1FxGQ8i

— Adam Wagner (@AdamWagner1) October 21, 2020

uh

This HMRC change to VAT on small imports is potentially hugely damaging to free trade and customer choice - article here https://t.co/zzybRFHScC summary below pic.twitter.com/Cyw5QgLPJW

— Paul Lewis (@paullewismoney) October 22, 2020

i wonder how paul lewis feels about being a week behind william shatner with that news?

There’s a reason why No. 10 is always so inclined to ratchet up the tension. Downing Street’s staff, and particularly the Vote Leave alumni, believe that one of their strengths is that in high-pressure situations, they stay calm while others panic https://t.co/vQGLxe1O2j

— James Forsyth (@JGForsyth) October 22, 2020

that man loves himself deeply.

calmly governing as they usually do

That man’s wife is Allegra Stratton.

I intended Dom when I typed that but on reflection could absolutely have been talking about any one of the shower

That Forsyth tweet is a very positive spin to put on their apparent inability to anticipate utterly predictable clusterfucks right in front them. It also doesn't make much sense given the number of panicky u-turns they've already report, not to mention the multiple leaks of a rancorous, panicky atmosphere inside Number 10.

Also that it never seems to work. Once their created panic is over, they generally cave and do what was plain at the beginning (like going back to trade deal negotiation after all). Holding the line on starving children the rare exception for now.

well, some things are so central to the tory mindset that you can't expect them to give up on them

Honestly, can barely believe what I’m reading here. 👇

Why on earth was this not put on the table on Tuesday to reach an agreement with us?

I said directly to the PM that a deal was there to be done if it took into account the effects on GM businesses of three months in Tier 2. https://t.co/w2AeeLitGP

— Andy Burnham (@AndyBurnhamGM) October 22, 2020

a point so solid even Laura K struggled to cast shade

Pickard is a Tory scrote

There was a paragraph in a Guardian report yesterday that claimed that the London hospitality sector counts for nearly a quarter of the UK economy, which seems astronomically high to me but might explain the turnaround.

it would be in Sunak/the Tory Party's interests to make every new package of funds look like a struggle or a concession. like the free school meals, the economic cost isn't really the issue. it's just against normal Tory interests to demonstrate what the State is capable of doing for its citizens, and argument and delay serve to reinforce just how exceptional and not to be made permanent any welfare funding is.

London as a whole counts for a quarter of the economy iirc.

Yeah that rang false to me, although I can believe that the levels of hospitality spending here were extremely high I don't think they were that high.

The government will end up picking up the tab whatever happens, whether it's through higher unemployment benefit, lost business and personal tax revenue, the loss of wider cultural capital (which in turn attracts actual capital), a further hit to GDP by further constraining a lot of people's spending power etc etc. Obviously I've never run the numbers but the costs of not keeping businesses going probably outweigh the costs of doing so, to the extent that keeping them going must be basically free.

But yeah NV OTM, plus they don't want the public to realise the extent to which businesses and the state are interdependent.