A Political Thread pt. 2

[General Melchett]

SNP broke off with the greens and ditched parts of it's climate pledge. Wales Labour changing a number of the 20mph limits. Cambridge Labour run just ditched it's congestion charge ideas because of the back lash.

Nobody in powers gives a monkeys about the climate when it might impact votes. Khan to his credit stood firm on it.

Don't dispute that but if we look at the root cause - the first thing Hunt did when he became Chancellor after Truss/Kwarteng crashed the economy was to make cuts. Key departments and councils were forced to trim budgets and climate never stood a chance when up against other public services. The four nations and councils finances are ultimately determined by No.11 and so I would point to 15 years of fiscal mismanagement (Brexit, pandemic mismanagement etc.) coming from No.11. George Osborne once accused Labour of not making hay while the sun was shining. The irony.

I'm not particularly a fan of Khan but I respect him for pushing ahead with ULEZ even if costs him politically. The air in London filthy and must be harming people's health. I don't understand the ULEZ protest votes when the cost of living crisis seemingly gets overlooked..

 

[Saintjay]

Don't dispute that but if we look at the root cause - the first thing Hunt did when he became Chancellor after Truss/Kwarteng crashed the economy was to make cuts. Key departments and councils were forced to trim budgets and climate never stood a chance when up against other public services. The four nations and councils finances are ultimately determined by No.11 and so I would point to 15 years of fiscal mismanagement (Brexit, pandemic mismanagement etc.) coming from No.11. George Osborne once accused Labour of not making hay while the sun was shining. The irony.

I'm not particularly a fan of Khan but I respect him for pushing ahead with ULEZ even if costs him politically. The air in London filthy and must be harming people's health. I don't understand the ULEZ protest votes when the cost of living crisis seemingly gets overlooked..

It's difficult because i also get how the Ulez disproportionately impacted on those less well off and low payed workers. The cost of living making it very difficult for those without wealth to get an EV or newer car. Coupled with public transport being expensive and unreliable. One benefit London does have over most places is the public transport infrastructure.

 

[General Melchett]

It's difficult because i also get how the Ulez disproportionately impacted on those less well off and low payed workers. The cost of living making it very difficult for those without wealth to get an EV or newer car. Coupled with public transport being expensive and unreliable. One benefit London does have over most places is the public transport infrastructure.

ULEZ isn't perfect. I would like to have seen some kind of sliding scale e.g. concessions for pensioners, families, small businesses etc. (basically those who really depend on cars/vans and have limited financial means) but I would imagine it's virtually impossible to implement such a system. People would start registering their cars in their Granny's name etc. You probably want to target people who could use public transport and choose not to. Easier said than done and it doesn't help that public transport is unreliable.

I don't think the tube and buses are the problem in London - it's trains. They are bloody expensive for what you get especially compared to other countries. I took a train from Gdansk to Warsaw a few months ago and the fare was about £12 for a journey time of around 3 hours. Just checked and the cheapest fare from London to Manchester travelling today costs £76 and the journey time is only 2 hours. London to Clacton costs £41 and the journey time is only 1 hour 26 mins. Scandalous.

 

[Deleted member 88328]

Lools like Khan will win quite comfortably now. Think the last big one will be the West Midlands.

It's strange how people keep bringing up the Gaza conflict. They do realise this is about bin collection, right?

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Street will win the West Midlands, independents split the Labour vote (plus the Labour guy is the least inspiring person they could've put forward and Street, for the most part, is just a Tory by name - and has done a lot to try and distance himself from them)

 

[Which Tyler]

Lib Dems still 8 ahead of the tories, 1 council left to declare.
I was NOT expecting them to actually win that battle (or be particularly close).

Greens still running at better than a 50% increase in councillors.

 

[Deleted member 88328]

Street will win the West Midlands, independents split the Labour vote (plus the Labour guy is the least inspiring person they could've put forward and Street, for the most part, is just a Tory by name - and has done a lot to try and distance himself from them)

I was thinking the same, but now

 

[Reiser99]

Well if the pattern plays out Conservatives will be just shy of losing 500 councillors and possibly only win one Mayoral election. That would be a thumping to dispell any notion of a Conservative revival.

 

[Reiser99]

I was thinking the same, but now

Full recount in Coventry apparently.

 

[Gavin]

Khan win by 10%

With all the talk yesterday of the Conservative candidate winning, they dropped their result compared to last time and Labour increased.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

I was thinking the same, but now

Yeah that is a surprise

Tbh I don't hate Street as Mayor - while I do think he was weak on the cancelling of HS2 and is mostly all talk no action of a number of things (public transport infrastructure he talks a bit talk on but delivers little), he's had a lot of good initiatives for tech in the WM and has more plans for the future which would benefit the region (based on talks at the Tech WM conference last year anyway)

 

[Al Bangor]

 

[ncurd]

Khan win by 10%

With all the talk yesterday of the Conservative candidate winning, they dropped their result compared to last time and Labour increased.

People reading too much into litle thing trying to find narrative to be be soothsayer against the polls.

Reality is post 2016 they've been mostly accurate.

 

[Yulia]

I don't think the tube and buses are the problem in London - it's trains. They are bloody expensive for what you get especially compared to other countries. I took a train from Gdansk to Warsaw a few months ago and the fare was about £12 for a journey time of around 3 hours.

I was in London last time 8 years ago (or something like that) and was shocked how transport there was much more expensive and worse than in some other countries (like Poland, Russia and Belarus, as examples). And it was pretty a long time ago! It's extremely expensive there and extremely bad to be honest. Not even trains, the underground is also terrible,small and expensive - can't even compare it with a clean and comfortable underground in Warsaw,or Moscow metro that looks like a museum and has super modern wide wagons with wifi (and even art exhibitions in some of them). Even Minsk metro that looks like a Soviet one, is still better.
When I first saw London underground, I called it "Hobbit's metro"

 

[Deleted member 88328]

Labour win the West Midlands by 1,508 votes.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Genuinely surprised at that

If even Street can't distance himself from the Tory stench then no MP is safe come GE time

 

[Reiser99]

Short of 1 Mayoral election, it's pretty much as bad as it can be for the Tories. Definitely at the lower end. What stood out for me though in the West Midlands was that Labour actually lost 1.9% of the vote compared to last time as it seems many Labour voters switched to the independent candidate Akhmed Yakoob over Gaza. Just imagine the scale of the loss if they had stayed with Labour. Obviously all hypothetical, but this coupled with only really holding Tees Valley because Ben Houchen ran on his own brand and not the Tory brand, then voting at a GE looks worse for the Tories. Also, while Reform may not have done fantastic, they've certainly taken votes from the Tories, which has broken their monopoly on the right.

 

[die_mole]

So is it now a game of chicken between rishi and the backbenchers?

 

[Reiser99]

So is it now a game of chicken between rishi and the backbenchers?

No. I think the Conservatives have now accepted that no one will turn this around and that another leadership election would just make things even worse. I imagine anyone who genuinely hopes to lead the party is waiting until after the General Election and will try to start fresh then.

 

[General Melchett]

Sunak really is a dead man walking now. You've got to wonder how the Tories recover from this. Maybe their broad church party doesn't really work anymore. The one nation Tories and far right are so badly divided and poles apart in terms of ideology. Maybe it's best they go their separate ways.