Westminster Politics 2024-2029

It’s not really tacitly support. Just a example showing how shite BlackRock are. To quote comrade Lenin - both are worse.
The lawsuit isn't really an example of how shite BlackRock are- their duplicity on ESG is more an adjacent issue tbh. Blackstone are way worse than BlackRock. But agree with Lenin.
 
Except when he said that, net migration had been 200k or so in the years prior, high by historic standards but largely manageable. Since then it has exploded to 3-4 times that level. Of course the govt approach is going to be different. It is disingenuous to pretend otherwise.
They could start by not including international student numbers in the figures.
 
Not about her conviction, which starmer has known about for years.

Its simply another roll of the 'shes too left wing' dice for the mandelsson mafia.



It's interesting that Labour are actioning the centre-right growth plans where the Tories spent 12 years going nowhere. It's not the right way to go environmentally but we do have a vaguely functioning government that puts growth changes through for the first time in a decade.
 
Odd way to do it through tacitly supporting the batshit environmental policies -and self interest over oil- of hard right US politicians though.
I never said I support any of it, you came to that conclusion.
 
They could start by not including international student numbers in the figures.
"Put bluntly, in an era of high net migration and low trust in politics, an approach which simply looks to cut the headline net migration stat by discounting those who come here to study would risk looking like a government that was cooking the books."

That's what the Universities themselves say (reasons in the link).
 
These million a year immigrants.

Over 70% of them come here for two reasons. One is to be students - they are funding our universities and they go home after they finish, the other is work, they already have jobs here. Many of those are doctors, nurses and other essential NHS staff.
It's not the case that students return in all instances, some 19% of students switched to skilled worker or graduate visas in 2022, and the numbers have been rising.

We left the EU partly to restrict the number of people coming into the UK. I didn't agree with that, partly because I recognise that immigration is important, but I do respect the political reality that it is a massive voter concern that needs to be listened to, not ignored.

Because if fairly moderate governments don't address it in a relatively balanced way, voters will find far more extreme governments who will address in a much more unbalanced way.
 
Because if fairly moderate governments don't address it in a relatively balanced way, voters will find far more extreme governments who will address in a much more unbalanced way.
Agreed, this is what is required; however it needs an electorate willing to listen and understand to find the balance, and unfortunately Britain no longer has such an electorate that is willing to listen, let alone understand.

The 'seeds' for this discontent can be traced back decades ago, when government after government signed off on treaty after treaty in the EU, without asking the British public. Until of course Cameron who came up with his 'in/out' referendum, a masterpiece of lazy administration that sought an expected 'in' vote and took scant disregard of all the previous opportunities to 'ask the public'............. we all know what happened next and we are going to have to live with it for generations. Trade may well be an obvious casualty, as many on the caf have pointed out, but the lasting legacy is likely to be over how to plan for and deal with increasing/urgent immigration issues.
 
"Put bluntly, in an era of high net migration and low trust in politics, an approach which simply looks to cut the headline net migration stat by discounting those who come here to study would risk looking like a government that was cooking the books."

That's what the Universities themselves say (reasons in the link).
That's one blog post from a Deputy Director of Policy at Universities UK, not the position of UK universities. Even in that post he qualifies the point you quote and says:

"None of this, however, should be read as a defence of the status quo. We desperately need to develop a better, more sophisticated, debate on immigration policy in the UK."

Over a decade or more Vice Chancellors and MPs representing university towns have been consistent in their opposition to blanketing foreign students as migrants.

In fact, here is a piece by the same author you cited providing much more detail and nuance to his quoted claim:

https://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/un...insights/international-students-and-graduates

It is also written two months after the earlier quoted piece.
 
More than 600 Brazilians deported by Home Office on three secret flights
More than 600 Brazilians, including 109 children, have been secretly removed from the UK – on the three largest Home Officedeportation charter flights in history – since the Labour government came to power, the Observerhas learned.

The Home Office has never before removed any nationality in such large numbers on individual deportation charter flights. It is thought that children have never before been removed on these flights.

https://theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/01/brazilians-deported-home-office-secret-flights-uk

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Report claiming Musk might give $100m to Reform UK revives calls for tighter donation laws, as Farage says it may be false​

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, has said that he does not believe a story saying Elon Musk, the multi-billionaire Trump ally and owner of X, might give his party $100m.

The suggestion was contained in a story published by the Sunday Times yesterday. It did not feature an on-the-record source for the claim, but it said “leading businessmen and Conservative Party officials believe there is a credible prospect that Musk is preparing to give $100 million (£78 million) to Farage as a “f*** you Starmer payment” with a view to transforming British politics”.

In an interview with GB News, Farage said that he did not know anything about this suggestion until he got a call about it from the Sunday Times on Saturday. He went on:
I suspect this is not true. Legally, companies operating in the UK can give money to UK political parties, but I think we’re a very long way away from that.

Look, if it did happen, well, that’d be great, but I think it’s one of those really very good gossipy Sunday newspaper things. Let’s see. But I rather doubt it.
But Farage did say Musk was “very supportive” of Reform UK. “He thinks that if Reform do well in the UK, we can bring about the same kind of change that he intends to do with Donald Trump in America,” Farage said.

In a blog on his Democracy for Sales Substack account Peter Geoghegan, the former editor-in-chief of openDemocracy and author of a book on the malign influence of money in politics, says this story illustrates why Britain’s laws on political donations need to be tightened. He says:
The craziest thing about this story is that it is all perfectly legal.

Musk is a South African-born billionaire who lives in the US. Our election laws are explicitly supposed to prevent foreign donations like this - but anyone, from anywhere, can get around the rules if they donate through a UK registered company. (A wheeze Robert Jenrick knows well.)

If Musk’s donation does materialise it will likely be made via the British branch of X/Twitter, the Sunday Times reports.

Trump’s right-hand man can pump as much Reform content as he wants onto this social media platform. Britain’s election laws, written for the analogue age, have barely changed since the digital revolution.
Geoghegan says it is frustrating that Labour has done almost nothing to change the rules in this area, but he says tightening the law would not be difficult.
 
Is the idea that you can make public education as good or even better than private education so far gone?
 
Is the idea that you can make public education as good or even better than private education so far gone?
Personally speaking, i went to a CofE school that was run like a private. My headteacher is now a dame infact, so in my opinion, no.
 
It'll be interesting to see the winners, hopefully there are some.
Yes, there will be if Starmer completes his plans, but in reality some of them have not been born yet.

The plan is to set Britain 'fair'/fare (take your pick) at least for the next 2/3 decades. It's a 'big ask' (10 years at least) and will not please everybody (as we have seen) but with this massive commons majority, Labour has a once in a lifetime chance to progress things for that part of working population that struggles to keep its head above water; in particular to lift the 'working poor' out of the perpetual poverty trap that has been set for them by the many (repeated) years of Tory rule.
 
Weird knock on effect?



Edit: before anyone post about the twitter handle. I don't care.

I think the woman's comments are more important.


If you are rich enough to have sent your kids to private school pre rises then you are wealthy, wealthier than the vast majority of people. Have absolutely no sympathy for those people at all.
 
If you are rich enough to have sent your kids to private school pre rises then you are wealthy, wealthier than the vast majority of people. Have absolutely no sympathy for those people at all.
The above is showing the knock on effect of people from disadvantaged backgrounds who might get bursaries and scholarships to a private school and now won’t be getting them as they’ll be probably be of the first things on the chopping block to reduce or get rid of entirely in order to swallow the vat rise.
Not the same thing, although caused by the same policy.
 
The above is showing the knock on effect of people from disadvantaged backgrounds who might get bursaries and scholarships to a private school and now won’t be getting them as they’ll be probably be of the first things on the chopping block to reduce or get rid of entirely in order to swallow the vat rise.
Not the same thing, although caused by the same policy.

Do you have anything substantial to back up that they're less likely to get a scholarship?

They don't give out scholarships due to altruism you know, those pupils are intended to lift average grades or represent the school in a specialism. I very much doubt they'll be less of them, the cost benefit analysis hasn't changed.
 
Do you have anything substantial to back up that they're less likely to get a scholarship?

They don't give out scholarships due to altruism you know, those pupils are intended to lift average grades or represent the school in a specialism. I very much doubt they'll be less of them, the cost benefit analysis hasn't changed.
I don't know how widespread it is, but if you listen to the woman in the tweet above, that school her daughter was hopeful of getting a bursary for, the school pulled all of them.
 
I don't know how widespread it is, but if you listen to the woman in the tweet above, that school her daughter was hopeful of getting a bursary for, the school pulled all of them.

I know you're just responding to a tweet directly and didn't post it but one tweet of absolute no detail is not a basis to form an opinion. There's no mention of the institution and a quick Google pulls up no incidents of theatre schools pulling bursaries.

The detail is important as otherwise we end up in situations like 1101 or whatever posting unsubstantiated bollocks shown to be incorrect.
 
If you are rich enough to have sent your kids to private school pre rises then you are wealthy, wealthier than the vast majority of people. Have absolutely no sympathy for those people at all.
I have members of my family who are in that boat. But yeah, still no sympathy, sorry.
 
I know you're just responding to a tweet directly and didn't post it but one tweet of absolute no detail is not a basis to form an opinion. There's no mention of the institution and a quick Google pulls up no incidents of theatre schools pulling bursaries.

The detail is important as otherwise we end up in situations like 1101 or whatever posting unsubstantiated bollocks shown to be incorrect.
Yep fair enough I took that at face value, which is a little naive in these times!
 
The above is showing the knock on effect of people from disadvantaged backgrounds who might get bursaries and scholarships to a private school and now won’t be getting them as they’ll be probably be of the first things on the chopping block to reduce or get rid of entirely in order to swallow the vat rise.
Not the same thing, although caused by the same policy.

Imagine if British people cared more about making sure public education is good enough that you don't need these exception scholarships.
 
I have members of my family who are in that boat. But yeah, still no sympathy, sorry.
Do you not like them?

Just don't understand it, I think other people in my family compare us young members of the family, we call each other all the time to help out - we don't compete, we work together to get better.

if my cuz called me to pick them up from anywhere i'd do it, or give them money i would. (i wouldn't even loan it). I take my family members out for meals all the time and i pay for it, i wouldn't ask them for anything and it works both ways.
 
Do you not like them?

Just don't understand it, I think other people in my family compare us young members of the family, we call each other all the time to help out - we don't compete, we work together to get better.

if my cuz called me to pick them up from anywhere i'd do it, or give them money i would. (i wouldn't even loan it). I take my family members out for meals all the time and i pay for it, i wouldn't ask them for anything and it works both ways.

You can like someone and not feel sympathy for them when they complain for financial matters, when they're well off, while most people in this country struggle.