Typo. Or was it..
Liz Truss will meet King Charles III for the first time since the death of the Queen on Friday afternoon.
As another victim comes into her sights - get ready to lick.
Westminster Politics
- Thread starter altodevil
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Liz Truss will meet King Charles III for the first time since the death of the Queen on Friday afternoon.
As another victim comes into her sights - get ready to lick.
It is a concern that the death of Queen Elizabeth so early in Liz Truss time as PM could actually work out well for her popularity. At least in the short term.
People will undoubtedly feel sorry for her in a perverse way.
Possibly for the first few weeks, yes but she hasn't got the personality to deflect when things starting going awry like BJ. If things get bad during the autumn/winter regarding energy costs she'll quickly lose any popularity.
Sorry if I’m not getting your intent, but Streeting is as working class as they come. He grew up poor in a council flat that was filled to bursting with siblings to a single parent. His grandparents spent plenty of time in prison, he spent time around east end gangsters for his entire adolescence. I’m aristocratic compared to him.
Great Uni education but few have had more challenging upbringings.
My ex manager always said to me "its better to be lucky than smart"
Couple this with an unpredicted swift Ukrainian victory, and the doom a gloom disappears. Totally unwarranted but she would be really well placed.
She can't curtsy though the lizard woman cnut that she is.
Yes. Yes, it is a worry.
Give it a few months. When people are freezing and hungry in December and January they’ll look to Truss to fix it and she won’t have an answer.
That is my view as well. Just an early honeymoon period.
Correct.
yeah i don't doubt it. it isn't him i'm having a go at here, more the way the system will use him. and i understand why it does what it does.
https://www.theguardian.com/politic...e-office-no-boats-crossing-the-channel-target
She getting paid to make the likes of Boris and Trump look smart?
She getting paid to make the likes of Boris and Trump look smart?
Fair enough MAFS UK is class.
Doesn't it give people ideas about immigrating through marriage though? (Full disclosure: I've not watched a minute of it. I just wanted to ridicule the notion of watching television to improve ones mental health)
https://www.theguardian.com/politic...nti-obesity-strategy-in-drive-to-cut-red-tape
Liz Truss could scrap anti-obesity strategy in drive to cut red tape
Exclusive: Health officials ‘aghast’ as review launched of measures to deter people from eating junk food
The review, commissioned by the new health secretary, Thérèse Coffey, is seen as part of the prime minister’s drive to cut burdens on business and help consumers through the cost of living crisis.
In new decree, all British people must look like Thérèse Coffey
Liz Truss could scrap anti-obesity strategy in drive to cut red tape
Exclusive: Health officials ‘aghast’ as review launched of measures to deter people from eating junk food
The review, commissioned by the new health secretary, Thérèse Coffey, is seen as part of the prime minister’s drive to cut burdens on business and help consumers through the cost of living crisis.
In new decree, all British people must look like Thérèse Coffey
anyone else notice the not too subtle move in media and state language away from citizen and toward "consumer". trying to business-ify everything.
in dealing with the state, you're increasingly likely to encounter documents which cast you in the role of "customer" or "consumer". never was the case until recently.
Not until you mentioned it but it's a given isn't it
suppose so. only a citizen also owns the services which the state provides. in this case, that would be the tax money being given to the private sector to keep energy prices at a certain level via debt. a consumer or customer might own part of the service but it isn't presupposed in the same way. never have we seen more enormous public transfers of wealth to private usage, but it's all being done within an idiom which mirrors a march toward a pure market economy. so a kind of "socialist" spending program but entirely to the benefit of business. hence corporate welfare.
could be phrased, "to help owners through the crisis" and it would be far more accurate as the "consumer" or "customer" here is the literal owner of the capital being used. like someone selling your own stuff back to you after stealing it.
It's more accurate - many users of government services are not UK citizens.
you think the tory government chooses to use "consumer" and "customer" in the spirit of inclusivity with regard to immigrants? i doubt it. and those who aren't citizens are often in the process of attaining citizenship, not consumership or customership.
What can we do to help the British public through the cost of living crisis… I know, we’ll give large wealthy corporations ridiculous amounts of tax payer’s money!
Nope, been here 30 years. No interest in citizenship thanks. Would prefer not to be excluded from government services that I consume though. So consumer is the better word. If the government directly addressed everything to "citizens" they'd be rightly criticised.
A tiny minority maybe. Can you expand?
surely "resident" would work, no? citizens and residents? going by your actual status within the country rather than a role which reduces all people to "customers" or "consumers" in their own state and of their own state. but again, they don't use this language for inclusivity. it's the same government that drafted the rwanda legislation and has people focused on migrants crossing the sea in boats.
or to put it another way. a very, very, tiny minority might prefer it, though resident with an asterisk or forward slash would still make sense, but works to redefine the role of the majority of citizens which actually own the state. and assuming you've been living 30 years without being a citizen you've probably also paid lots of tax which puts you in the citizen category anyway in my book, whether you define yourself that way or not. you're paying for the services being sold to you.
14.5% of the UK population were born overseas
just under 10% of the population are non UK citizens
https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/migrants-in-the-uk-an-overview/#:~:text=As of the year ending,in 2021 (Figure 1).
so I guess it depends what constitutes a tiny minority as thats subjective
Non UK nationals has doubled since 2004 so on current trends approx 20% of the population would be non uk nationals by 2040 and when planning public services (building hospitals, schools, roads, powergrids etc) I think its prudent to take that long term trend in to account (basically you will have to build capacity factoring non UK nationals into your thinking
I suspect any public feelings one way or the other will be affected by the reported £100B or so Truss will 'handout' to the nation to cover energy costs, by the time we have to pay it back she will be long gone. Can't help but feel she has landed on her feet here!
What was Napoleon's comment that he would rather have 'lucky' Generals than good ones?
but do you really think the tory government, this tory government, uses "customer" or "consumer" because it doesn't want to alienate non uk nationals? they could also use "shareholder", instead, as it would cover all citizens and residents and also imply the status citizenship presupposes regarding the collective ownership of the state.
this is the government which brought you brexit, windrush, rwanda, and god knows how many other anti-immigrant schemes in between. i think it's obviously part of a larger trend which wants to see complete privatization of everything within the state, including the "state" itself. so you become a customer when dealing with government, implying that you don't own the government in your actual role as citizen but that you simply do business with it.
I’ve worked in various Government departments for over 15 years and they’ve always called the public customers in that time.
Then make tax payers pay it back again whilst stripping money from organisations and areas where its really needed. (See NHS etc etc)
yeah and it's not just the uk. but i've noticed an acceleration. everything is now customerized. and 15 years would cover the relevant period. be interesting to see how often it happened prior to blair or thatcher.
i mean, in what context are the public customers? you aren't a customer of the nhs. you're a patient. you're not a customer of schemes which involve your own tax money, but the owner, or shareholder, of said schemes. it's a kind of sleight of hand. steady neoliberal mission creep.
are you a customer of your university or a student? in literature produced by the rand corporation, they advocated using "customer" over "student" and the steady and complete privatization of all such public places.
are you a customer when you vote, or are you the voter or electorate? it's just a way of gaslighting people. seems harmless and inane but it's highly intentional. you can see criticsm of this kind of thing in studies on pedagogy.
I basically think you're letting your dislike of the government tint everything you see. Things like the cost of living crisis is relevant to consumers, because the things they consume (food, energy, etc) are the thing that's increasing. You don't have to be a citizen or a resident or a shareholder (particularly bizarre suggestion, that) for the crisis to impact you, you just need to be someone that consumes these things that are suddenly much more expensive. So consumer is the appropriate word to use.
Right, that's me done defending tories. Off for a bath.
no, it's been a thing since before the tories. the tories are only accelerating it.
that's from 2007 and on the impact of neoliberalism in the postcolonial world. it's an intentional public relations inspired lingo designed to recast the citizen in the role of subordinate.
on the idea that you don't have to be a "citizen or a resident or a shareholder" for the crisis to impact you. i disagree. of course you do. if you're consuming within a specific country, you're then a citizen or a resident and thus a shareholder insofar as your tax money is what enables the government to spend, and to cast you in the role of "customer", in the first place.
"we want to help customers through the cost of living crisis". think about that. the "customers" are the taxpaying citizens or residents whose money is being used to "help them" through the crisis! which is what makes them the "shareholders" or "owners". the government has just inculcated the language of the private sector, wholesale. it's something you'd expect to hear from any corporate press release.
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I think if you access a service you are technically a customer. I don’t think it’s as bad a a thing as you are suggesting. If anything I think the idea was to look at recipients of benefits etc as customers who deserve good service the way a ‘paying’ customer would.
i think it seeks to make a franchise out of representative democracy. take benefits. that's part of the welfare state. casting someone as "customer" implies that you own the means by which you distribute health, or benefits, or whatever it is, and that they do not. you're a customer at starbucks because you don't own it and have no share in its holdings. the state should not seek to replicate that.
it's really very much in line with thatcher's ideal of there being no distinction between the public and private spheres except insofar as all is privately owned.
If we didn’t call people on benefits customers we would be calling them claimants. I’m not sure that’s an improvement. You may be right on the original idea but I’m not sure it’s the kick in the stones for the public that you think.