Do you want to discuss boring politics? (23 Viewers)

[Grendel]

Physical appearance wise imagine Ed Sheeran but with better facial hair, fashion sense and above all else, a better voice

Im getting Capaldi vibes

 

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[rob9872]

Nah I've always pictured you as Jeremy Clarkson

Well I have been known to rock the blue jeans and brown shoes combo and whilst it's not often you'd take Clarkson as a favourable comparison , over Levi it definitely is.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Not since the days of Chris Pincher has a politician’s surname described him so well

What happened?

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Im getting Capaldi vibes

If you're on about my singing ability, Peter Capaldi is probably more accurate

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

If you're on about my singing ability, Peter Capaldi is probably more accurate

Saw him on a mind advert he looked very unwell Lewis that is

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Well I have been known to rock the blue jeans and brown shoes combo and whilst it's not often you'd take Clarkson as a favourable comparison , over Levi it definitely is.

In a similar note @CCFCSteve is 100% Piers Morgan.

 

[fernandopartridge]

Not necessarily. The business I’m with had to absorb significant losses on 1-2 big contracts because of inflation driven by the war in Ukraine.

Fixed term contracts are normal in the business world and in fact, a contract I’ve negotiated personally is fixed for 3 years.

What you’re explaining in the above probably highlights the differences in procurement in the two sectors.

Yes, fixed for three years and the supplier will have factored in assumptions on inflation over the term, so from day one of the contract you will be paying more.

 

[fernandopartridge]

In a very competitive race I think Nandy might be the most disingenuous of the lot

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

Yes, fixed for three years and the supplier will have factored in assumptions on inflation over the term, so from day one of the contract you will be paying more.

Not in my case because the leverage was on my side. It’s a great when you can play suppliers against one another. Likewise, a contract for an existing supplier has remained the same prices since 2021 because the competition in the sector has kept prices down otherwise businesses will change the processes, cut costs and automate manual processes.

Businesses don’t operate purely on that basis that costs inevitably have rise YoY with inflation. Your approach seems to accept it as an inevitability.

 

[chiefdave]

In a very competitive race I think Nandy might be the most disingenuous of the lot

Great start to cleaning up football

 

[chiefdave]

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

In a very competitive race I think Nandy might be the most disingenuous of the lot

Love how this is the same as Conservative donors making millions on Anand billions of pounds

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

And the end of the country as we know it

 

[SBT]

And the end of the country as we know it

Britain’s already gone mate

 

[SBT]

Does that poll factor in tactical voting? Surely Reform won’t get anywhere near that number of seats.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Does that poll factor in tactical voting? Surely Reform won’t get anywhere near that number of seats.

Resigned to them getting them
We’ll become a pariah tax haven

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

Absolute scenes to see Tory-Lab on less than 50 seats combined.

It’s credible that Labour get decimated across the board, a lot of polls had shown them only hanging in London and few other major metropolitan cities where they are particularly vulnerable to the Greens. The ‘Red Wall’ has always been socially conservative hence we’ll see a lot of places like Wrexham, Bolsover, Ashford and Barnsley all flip to Reform.

Hubris from both main parties to believe our electoral system was incapable of punishing them as has happened across continental Europe.

 

[fernandopartridge]

Love how this is the same as Conservative donors making millions on Anand billions of pounds

What's the point in comparing with what the Tories do? It's childish.

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

Resigned to them getting them
We’ll become a pariah tax haven

Did somebody say Singapore-on-Thames?!

A lot of people felt this about Meloni in Italy and so far, it’s gone reasonably well for them.

 

[fernandopartridge]

Not in my case because the leverage was on my side. It’s a great when you can play suppliers against one another. Likewise, a contract for an existing supplier has remained the same prices since 2021 because the competition in the sector has kept prices down otherwise businesses will change the processes, cut costs and automate manual processes.

Businesses don’t operate purely on that basis that costs inevitably have rise YoY with inflation. Your approach seems to accept it as an inevitability.

I'm a buyer and a seller mate, they certainly do operate like that.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

What's the point in comparing with what the Tories do? It's childish.

There’s not as the situations are incomparable but have become equivalent in everyone’s eyes by the media
It’s madness Labour have been in power for a year after 14 of tories
1900’s Labour were in power for 19 of them
If the mainstream parties have failed it’s on one more than the other
Irrespective we’ve thrown expertise and competence and equity and kindness and fairness out the window
Shame on us

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Did somebody say Singapore-on-Thames?!

A lot of people felt this about Meloni in Italy and so far, it’s gone reasonably well for them.

In what way?

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

Does that poll factor in tactical voting? Surely Reform won’t get anywhere near that number of seats.

Tactical voting works both ways and both main parties have hitherto been too hubristic to consider electoral pacts. This was evident in 2019 when pro-remain parties split the vote, whilst the Brexit Party stood aside in Tory seats. The funniest example was a ex-Tory Lib Dem fighting Chelsea and Kensington to ‘stop the tories and Brexit’… the seat was held by a pro-remain Labour MP and shockingly, a Tory was elected!

Besides, it’s not even clear in a lot of these seats who the best party to tactically vote for of Green-LD-Lab. The writing is on the wall for Labour right now because their voting base feels the same way Tory voters did in 2024. Farage is more likely to do an electoral deal with the Tories than Polanski, Davey or Starmer imo. Particularly if there was an organised ‘coalition’ against Reform.

It’s still too early to declare, but British politics is in the process of a major realignment (obvious since Brexit) and both the traditional main parties are not riding the wave well at all.

In what way?

Elections are no longer annual affairs in Italy…

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

You can’t be serious? How many Labour run councils are bankrupt, or nearing bankruptcy?

On the national level, Labour nicked one of Reform’s dumbest policy ideas (increasing NI on foreign workers) and applied it to the whole workforce.

On Reform as a party, what are people’s reasonable expectations? They were barely a party 18 months ago and now they’re a part of government for a few councils.

I certainly have concerns about the calibre of Reform’s talent but looking at Labour’s cabinet, there’s no one who’s really held any senior positions in the private sector. The one entrepreneur advising them has quit. Low calibre talent across the board.

Right now, the Labour Party serves 2 groups: public sector workers and benefit claimants. There won’t be a shortage of people on here arguing they don’t do that particularly well.

A big part of that is the increased burden of social care on local authorities. A higher proportion of the costs have been foisted on them without an appropriate increase in funding while actual demand for it has risen rapidly.

There's other factors too of course but if you want to look for a major reason for it I'd suggest this would be a very good starting place.

 

[PVA]

Those 'Find out now' polls seem to be massive outliers, they're very different to every other poll.

Nowhere else has greens second place or labour near 15%.

 

[mmttww]

Hubris from both main parties to believe our electoral system was incapable of punishing them as has happened across continental Europe.

Yeah, massive complacency and lazy vote winning policies rather than stuff that tackled anything meaningful incl. Labour for a chunk of Blair and Brown.

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

Thats what a lot of us said about Starmer and reeves - How is that going?

And many of us were sceptical about what they would do or might achieve. For a lot of us it was more hope than expectation.

And this is after only a year. Why did it take Tory voters 14 to realise they were nothing more than incompetent chancers on the take? If anything the argument you're putting forward is that Labour voters are far quicker on the uptake than Tory ones.

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

They don’t and you know it deep down. Look at your comments on the NHS, £25bn or whatever has lead to no improvement. All the public sector pay rises and productivity is still behind COVID levels, this is an outlier in Europe.

There’s no accountability in the public sector and when something goes bankrupt, these institutions will go cap in hand to central government. Profit motives do at least drive some innovation and efficiencies to make more money.

In the private sector, this obviously happens too but they can’t rely on government bail outs.

The banking sector says hello.

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

The banking sector says hello.

Suppose the government should’ve let Northern Rock and NatWest go to pop and with it, people’s savings…

 

[mmttww]

Nandy might be the most disingenuous of the lot

FFS! how can you botch something this much when it's your own f*cking idea to start with - so sh*t.

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

Suppose the government should’ve let Northern Rock and NatWest go to pop and with it, people’s savings…

Do you not agree there should be accountability? And people had savings of up to £80k guaranteed by the government anyway.

And I was far more in treating them as they would in their own sector - dog eat dog. "You're bankrupt, so we offer you nothing. Your other option is go out of business."

And if some had gone out of business you might have actually seen some change in the way that industry works and less risk taking. Bailing them out and they almost immediately went back to risky investing, massive dividends and complaining about regulation and tax. It taught them nothing.

 

[Grendel]

Love how this is the same as Conservative donors making millions on Anand billions of pounds

Why get deflector shields on? It’s just unacceptable isn’t it?

 

[CCFCSteve]

Do you not agree there should be accountability? And people had savings of up to £80k guaranteed by the government anyway.

And I was far more in treating them as they would in their own sector - dog eat dog. "You're bankrupt, so we offer you nothing. Your other option is go out of business."

And if some had gone out of business you might have actually seen some change in the way that industry works and less risk taking. Bailing them out and they almost immediately went back to risky investing, massive dividends and complaining about regulation and tax. It taught them nothing.

The whole financial system was about to collapse. The banks don’t have the cash if everyone wants to withdraw their money so there would’ve been civil unrest before the government could’ve got control of the situation

senior bankers should’ve punished for what happened though, it was a disgrace nobody was

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

Do you not agree there should be accountability? And people had savings of up to £80k guaranteed by the government anyway.

And I was far more in treating them as they would in their own sector - dog eat dog. "You're bankrupt, so we offer you nothing. Your other option is go out of business."

And if some had gone out of business you might have actually seen some change in the way that industry works and less risk taking. Bailing them out and they almost immediately went back to risky investing, massive dividends and complaining about regulation and tax. It taught them nothing.

The FCS guarantee up to 31.7k for people and firms at that time. Which isn’t a lot for small business, but financial system collapses if people can’t do basic transactions or simple things like wages being paid. Bailing out the banks was a lesser of two weevils.

To find common ground, people probably should’ve went to jail for this.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Why get deflector shields on? It’s just unacceptable isn’t it?

Cause it’s not as bad but it is bad and completely unnecessary I agree