"we'll change the things that need changing and that's all we'll change": the paSUKification of post-brexit politics 2021

I wonder how many of these cancer treatment operations were already postponed. I've got an auntie with cancer who at the start of the pandemic was turned down for surgery and then they changed their mind because there was some kind of improvement/more positive diagnosis and I think she's still waiting.

Paul Mason still hasn't noticed that the political Left have been systematically and brutally purged from the Labour Party.

That might be why they're not building a positive and united programme within the Labour Party.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FGeqSeDXsAA5vj5?format=jpg&name=medium

the day the twitter algorithm gained sentience!

It has been quite something to witness Conservative MPs across the full spectrum of broadcast media today vociferously rejecting the prospect of being asked for papers showing they have a right to occupy whatever space they wish. Imagine feeling like that for your entire fucking lives, gentlemen.

"We are a patriotic party and it is our patriotic duty to vote for these measures to ensure that they go through."

Sir Keir Starmer says in a statement that Labour will support the government's Covid Plan B measures in Tuesday's Commons vote. pic.twitter.com/3fAhk5MALy

— Channel 4 News (@Channel4News) December 13, 2021

the tories are certain to have a sizable rebellion here and need Labour's votes for plan b and this cunt isn't even using this leverage to push for anything that might support workers. I genuinely hope he dies ... very fucking painfully.

"I will hold the government to account in the coming weeks”

seriously cunt, go for a holiday on a Komodo island.

'Hospitals can discharge medically fit patients to hotels' https://t.co/qRRxwL1s22

— Dr Duncan Robertson (@Dr_D_Robertson) December 13, 2021

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/dec/14/boris-johnson-tory-party-radicals-conservative

Stopped clock right twice a day, etc.

I don't think the right of the party is going to be happy with Sunak taking over and i'm not sure the membership can be trusted to back Truss at this point.

Truss the 2nd fav in the betting to be next PM was not something many would have predicted a few years back!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FGjk5_LVEAAx0Z8?format=jpg&name=large

The dreadful McT neglected to mention the calculated placement of Supreme Lipstick on the shelf or maybe Baroness Chapman accidentally left it there while Mrs Starmer was away?

the tories are certain to have a sizable rebellion here and need Labour's votes for plan b and this cunt isn't even using this leverage to push for anything that might support workers. I genuinely hope he dies ... very fucking painfully.

― calzino, Monday, December 13, 2021

Calzino always OTM on these matters.

McTernan definitely trolling us now.

The responses of the sensible polprofs and Jimmy Bollock also notable

This is a phenomenal — and utterly cursed — exchange. pic.twitter.com/GPpRm6aJuU

— Elvis Buñuelo (@Mr_Considerate) December 13, 2021

hah hah get Eddie Marsan in to voice coach Kieth!

someone once pointed out that McT is one of the few aging Blairites that seems genuinely curious about what the left are saying, albeit as an oddball trolling Labour Right reply guy.

and stranglers fan

I saw him acting all excitable and teenybopper-like at a gig at Cafe Oto once, I think it was the Jaki Liebezeit/Hans-Joachim Irmler gig.

oh no

Bouncing about in his seat, furious head nodding, punching the air - actually I don't know if he did punch the air but you get the picture, not pretty.

I'm sure conference speeches by David Blunkett had a similar effect.

Tories are rattling through these.

BREAKING BAD NEWS: today Gvt launch their attack on the Human Rights Act. Detail to follow, headlines are:
1. Stripping away right to family & private life. This will hit everyone wanting to protect their private data, fight an eviction, secure LGBT equality, resist surveillance

— Martha Spurrier (@marthaspurrier) December 14, 2021

hi mr “we’re not a ‘papers, please’ society” - dis you?

think he just meant the 'please' part

I bet the "Boris done a quiz" crew will be all over this, no worries

hi mr “we’re not a ‘papers, please’ society” - dis you?

Typical Tories though, they'd have the plebs in leg irons if they could but don't try putting any sort of restrictions on them and theirs. If they could get away with going back to only allowing property owners to vote they would.

Labour on the HRA:

This is little more than an attempt to wage culture wars because they’ve surrendered from waging war on crime

xp they probably can

xp so mass abstaining is the only patriotic way forward for the party of the people?

“They aren’t even being properly authoritarian like we would”

Great that that’s the attack when they pull this shit, really something to get behind

I can't wait till the next election and CCHQ does a vid with a soundtrack of Kieth pledging to protect immigrants in 2020 over a pic of him bending the knee. And then any temporary gains he's made, illusory or maybe even real. Gone in one fell swoop!

Right again

Tonight I will oppose both compulsory vaccines for NHS staff, and the introduction of vaccine passports. Both measures are counterproductive and will create division when we need cooperation and unity.

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) December 14, 2021

Any of the other non-Tories against given a more explicit reason than that? Lucas gave the same.

tbh I did not look too hard...my own MP made their case well

The legislation for mandatory jabs has worrying implications for our overstretched & understaffed health service.

It’s no way to build confidence & consent.

If the PM can’t build vaccine confidence because he has lost moral authority, he must make way for someone who can.

2/5

— Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP (@BellRibeiroAddy) December 14, 2021

BREAKING: 10 cops to jump you in the supermarket aisle and force you to buy giant coucous instead of wholemeal https://t.co/2EGW9GXCxF

— michael (@Sisyphusa) December 15, 2021

The Tory MP for Shrewsbury and Atcham asked a fixer to find him work with a Saudi employer, describing himself as the most “pro-Saudi” member of parliament and boasting that the Saudi leader, Mohammed bin Salman, “has stated that Saudi has no better friend in UK than me”.

In one message, Kawczynski said: “I am looking for a position with a company as non exec director or adviser/consultant. Obviously my passion for Anglo Arab relations (is) something which could help a company with relations in the UK or Middle East. Not sure what remuneration I am looking for but you are such a good negotiator!!! Best wishes Daniel.”

In another, the Tory MP asked the fixer for paid work on a conference related to Saudi Arabia’s regional foe, Qatar: “Promise you will push for good remuneration too for me … I need it to pay school fees!

Tory MP needing ‘to pay school fees’ pleaded for lucrative Middle East work

lool at this 8ft tall yeti and his "passion for Anglo Arab relations"

they shouldn't have kids if they can't afford the public school fees

He doesn't want to be a burden to the taxpayer

Quite an interesting piece on the Shropshire by-election that ends up going all over the place.

Earlier this year, an episode of the ‘Antiques Roadshow’ made headlines because it was watched by more people than the BBC’s Olympics coverage, with an audience of 4.7 million. The British equivalent of the brilliant US show ‘Queer Eye’ is ‘The Repair Shop’ - which, rather than being about mending people, is about fixing up their heirlooms. It’s watched by about 10% of the British public.

The antiques trading game show ‘Bargain Hunt’ is more popular than ‘Dr Who’, while ‘Fake or Fortune’, ‘Money for Nothing’, ‘Salvage Hunters’, ‘Antiques Road Trip’ and the aptly named ‘Flog It!’ captivate an army of pensioners every day as they are encouraged to dream of the possible treasure left in their attic by some long-dead relative.

Surely no human society can ever have been so obsessed with flogging off relics of its glorious past than Britain today. And it’s no wonder. As a country we don’t really produce wealth, we sell the dwindling assets of the empire, whether tangible trinkets, access to offshore havens, public-school educations or reputations to those who need theirs laundered.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/why-do-the-tories-have-a-chance-of-winning-north-shropshire/

But its politics are totally alien to Perthshire.

Uh right. North Perthshire voted Liberal, then Tory for 70 years, and now it votes SNP - because Tories in the area have decided they quite like the idea of an independent Scotland, they're still Tories though.

Just catching up on this by-election discourse and there is surely no way the Lib Dems are taking this seat.

lol that bullshit... it's happening again. The Labour candidate is the most Tory looking motherfucker with a red rosette I've seen in long time.

the Guardian reporting that the Libdems are the bookies favs when they finished a remote third in '19, with 12% less of the vote than Labour.

as the betting currently stands it's 8/15 for a Tory hold, that 11/8 on the Libdems seems ridiculous.. lol Labour 66/1.

Bookies know.

They just do.

Having said that - if the Guardian are saying they are fav, then they are misreading those odds.

it was two days ago tbf on them and the odds might have changed since. But also possibly not.

On the night of the Batley + Spen byelection the last hour betting market moves for Labour suggested they might do better than expected. But that was a tight marginal, it will take a hell of dissatisfied Tory voters swing to overturn a 22k+ majority.

if Labour do finish 3rd with a lower vote share than 2019 what feeble excuses shall be used?