I get it, there's a distinction between party and personal donations. The party donation system is still dodgy though, even with oversight - any donation from a corporation or millionaire is done for a reason as per the Waheed Alli one to Sue Gray's son to assist campaigining and getting a Westminster pass.
Westminster Politics 2024-2029
- Thread starter Pexbo
- Start date
I get it, there's a distinction between party and personal donations. The party donation system is still dodgy though, even with oversight - any donation from a corporation or millionaire is done for a reason as per the Waheed Alli one to Sue Gray's son to assist campaigining and getting a Westminster pass.
“I'll give you my season ticket when you pry (or take) it from my cold, dead hands."
Also there is always a tweet
I didn’t know Liam Conlon was Sue Grey son
Indeed he is.
Hand chosen from central office, not the local CLP I might add.
There are a lot of those, and most of them are dodgy. This will be a government of endless sleaze. From streetings partner to sue gray's son, endless actual lobbyists for big pharma, oil and gas, the water industry and more, akehurst a paid lobbyist for Israel, there is no end to how starmer interfrered in candidate selection.
Like this case of nepotism, they will all come back to bite him.
I agree.
Thanks. Yep that makes sense now.
Agree it’s going to be 4 long years of absolute shite.
There were plenty of Labour candidates who were parachuted in. Like Luke Akehurst in Durham North.
Maybe the worst person currently in the Labour Party which is saying a lot. The parachute candidates have seemingly always been a issues even under Corbyn it happened.
Although I think with Starmer there has been a big increase in lobbyists.
Yup. Akehurst is a lobbyist for Israel. He’d support Israel even if it killed his mum.
Are you volunteering guillotine duty?
For legal reasons all I’m saying is I’d look good in a hood
Doesn't seem to be working out too well for them.
The people vote to the left and the government gets more to the right.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c8rd52zl018o
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/general-election-2024.482793/post-32143435
Yeah, they didn't even try.
Yeah, they didn't even try.
Then they should do it again!
For the people who are inevitably going to go back to gutter style US politics of "Yeah but the Tories did worse", should labor not be held to a higher standard as a supposedly better government than the tories? Or are we meant to continually accept the bar being lower and lower?
Is this a contest to the bottom?
She voted for the 2-child benefit cap. 32% of kids in her cosntituency live in poverty.
Hunger for thee, taylor swift for me.
“I'll give you my season ticket when you pry (or take) it from my cold, dead hands."
Also there is always a tweet
Are you comparing a PM who broke the law with one who, whilst greedy, acted within the code regarding gifts?
Again the rank conflation going on here. One example is of £112,000 for redecorating which Boris lied to his ethics advisor about, resulting in him quitting, hid from Parliament until he couldn’t any longer, and then tried to cover up by suggesting he lost his phone.
Then there’s also the fact that shadow ministers / leaders of opposition have to declare much more because actual ministers / secretaries of state don’t have to declare hospitality etc when ‘executing their role’.
You’re doing it again
Won't somebody please think of the code regarding gifts!
Comparing breaking the law with not? Heaven forbid!
Or comparing a single gift that a PM hid, resulting in their ethics advisor quitting, to a PM’s total over five years?
Or noting the fact about ministers being free from the obligation of disclosing hospitality etc? A fact I’ve actually it seen in the thread as yet.
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It’s kinda important when people conflate one with the other.
Now, should the code regarding gifts exist in the first place? That’s a very different conversation.
Just pointing out the media hypocrisy.
Anything to stop the one we are currently having would be great.
Absolutely!
Ban all private / company donations over £X per donation and cap it annually at £Y.
Provide annual budgets for the office of PM in a similar way that exists with No.10 decorations for things like clothing, hospitality etc.
Anything like holidays etc need to be bettered for potential conflict of interest and have a statute of limitations of 10yrs for any future conflicts.
How’s that?
Until that exists I’ll continue to see someone acting within the existing rules as better than someone who shirks even their own pretty lax rules.
All of that is great so why are you pro Starmer/Labour then ?
I’m not particularly hopeful but maybe the next 4 years will highlight to a lot of well meaning progressives that the centrists they support aren’t really any different to the conservatives they dislike.
Tbh the true centrist and non ideological position is to hate both the tories and Starmer.
Also all power to the jam man in islington
Also all power to the jam man in islington
I’m ‘pro’ Starmer because the alternative is the Party that had Boris, Truss and Sunak ‘running’ our country.
I’m not generally pro-Starmer: I want UBI, nationalised water, energy, rail, housing, broadband (essentially all vital infrastructure), renters’ rights including rent control, price capping at seller level so they take the hit, not the consumer, workers’ rights including actual sick pay and implementation of the four-day working week (I’m currently championing this at my workplace, trying to convince our Directors to trial it) which is more than this Labour (or ANY UK party) is willing to offer.
BUT I also acknowledge the system we live in allows for one of two Party’s to have power in the UK. I also acknowledge that declaring £100,000 in gifts over five years is better than hiding a single £112,000 gift that resulted in an ethics advisor leaving.
So pro-Starmer? No, he’s cowardly and nowhere near ambitious enough for me, but he’s better than what’s been on offer since 2010.
Fair enough. Thanks for reply.
So every politician it turns out is at least a little bit dodgy.
Correct me if I’m oversimplifying but would a fairer system be that the government (from its vast budget) gives each party a sum of money
(I haven’t worked out how to apportion that equitably) . For elections, campaigning, everything.
No donations possible. No gifts, no nothing.
Give the PM £1m a year or whatever is needed, give them a £20k clothes allowance or whatever. Just make it all above board.
Then anything that is accepted = dodgy.
Or am I being simple?
Correct me if I’m oversimplifying but would a fairer system be that the government (from its vast budget) gives each party a sum of money
(I haven’t worked out how to apportion that equitably) . For elections, campaigning, everything.
No donations possible. No gifts, no nothing.
Give the PM £1m a year or whatever is needed, give them a £20k clothes allowance or whatever. Just make it all above board.
Then anything that is accepted = dodgy.
Or am I being simple?
This would make good sense but elements of the media have ensured it is very politically impalatable. A majority of this size is the time to do it though.
Renters right's is certainly interesting but it depends on how it would be done.
Rental control is a no-no however. Berlin tried it and it ended in disaster. What happened was rents got forcibly dropped by around 10-30% (up to 40% in some cases) and supply of housing dropped by 18%.
Then, the forced decrease in rent caused a 39% spike in 6 months of people seeking rentals. People who were previously living in suburbs and commuting, decided that the price was worth it now.
You had cases of 60 people turning up in 1 day to view a 600 euro a month studio in Alexanderplatz and it was run on pure luck and 'vibes' as to who would get it because trying to outbid the other potential tenants was now practically illegal.
Then the whole thing got axed because it was deemed unconstitutional by the courts.
Germany has stricter rent control at the federal government level than the UK does (Read: None existence practically) but rent in itself isn't a problem as much as it is in the UK because the UK is so London centric whereas Germany has lots of widespread economic centres (Berlin, Munich, Hamburg, Dortmund, Stuggart, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf etc)
Rent seems to be an issue only in London too, you can rent a 2 bed penthouse in Castlefield for the same you pay for a shitty bedroom in central London. The cost of a 1 bed in Zone 2 London is the same as said penthouse in the middle of Manchester.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves tells the BBC there "won't be a return to austerity", despite her warnings about the public finances
Reeves was pressed on her "doom and gloom" message since taking office - and if she was repeating the "austerity" policies of the 2010 Conservative-Liberal Democrat government
She insists there will be "real terms increases to government spending in this Parliament"
From the BBC liveblog
Reeves was pressed on her "doom and gloom" message since taking office - and if she was repeating the "austerity" policies of the 2010 Conservative-Liberal Democrat government
She insists there will be "real terms increases to government spending in this Parliament"
From the BBC liveblog
Yep, makes perfect sense.
The national debt – the sum total of every deficit – rose by 4.3 percentage points during the year to August to 100% of GDP
I don't even think the 'main' issue is renter per-say, it's the movement of traffic from traditional renting to short term lets like Air B'n'B. People are seeing that they can make 2, 3, 4 times their monthly income in seasonal Air B'n'B rather than a long term rental, which mean that the long-term rental market is shrinking, hence higher prices.
%100 of GDP isn't that bad and is easily fixable if there is political will to do so.