The Chairman Mao resembling, Monarchy hating, threat to Britain, Labour Party thread

[ml1dch]

 

Wouldn't want them making any noises about things not being quite perfect now, would we?

[Chindie]

Something something effective opposition.

[dAVe80]

2 minutes ago, Chindie said:

Something something effective opposition.

Something something something now is not the time. 

[blandy]

8 minutes ago, Chindie said:

Something something effective opposition.

They've said something that is completely accurate, and contains suggested improvements and opposition to the Gov't.

Starmer said this:

Quote

The government said that the vaccine would be the security wall against the virus and now the government is letting that wall crumble. 

We’ve seen those that most need it not able to get the jab they need. Only. I think, 17% of children have got the vaccine. And the booster programme has slowed down so much that at this rate we’re not going to complete it until spring of next year. 

So the government needs to change these, it needs to get a grip. I think it needs to drive those numbers up to at least 500,000 vaccines a day. And that can be done, I think, by using community pharmacists ... pop-up centres for vaccines, and mobilising those retired health workers as we did before....

The question we need to ask is why is plan A failing? And it’s failing because the government has allowed that wall of the vaccine to crumble.

And the Health one said this:

Quote

On current trends we won’t complete boosters until March 2022. Instead of doing just 165,000 booster jabs a day, why not set a commitment to do 500,000 jabs a day and get this programme completed by Christmas, mobilising pop-up clinics and making better use of community pharmacies?

The third dose for immuno-compromised has been described as chaotic by charities. Why not allow them to use walk-in centres?

Despite around 10,000 infections a day in children, vaccination for children is only 17% done, a stuttering rollout falling behind other nations ...

With infections running so high, the secretary of state needs to stop vacillating and get vaccinating. The wall of defence is crumbling. With this virus you have to get ahead of it before it gets ahead of you.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2021/oct/21/uk-covid-coronavirus-live-news-plan-b-lockdown-vaccines?page=with:block-61713e8e8f08677c375d8297#liveblog-navigation

[tomsky_11]

3 hours ago, blandy said:

it needs to get a grip

Lol

[HanoiVillan]

Labour love demanding that various ministers 'get a grip'. I assume it's such a popular thing to say because it sounds like you're annoyed without committing you to supporting any particular course of action.

[blandy]

5 hours ago, HanoiVillan said:

Labour love demanding that various ministers 'get a grip'. I assume it's such a popular thing to say because it sounds like you're annoyed without committing you to supporting any particular course of action.

I think it’s more deliberate than that. It’s one of those “repeat mantra” things that the various parties do. They will hope that the general public recognises that the guvmint repeatedly fails to “get a grip” of matters.

[Jareth]

Christ this should be renamed the anyone but tory thread. Personally I hate having to come back here but we must turn these non caring words removed out.Just a simple look at Bozza makes my blood boil - he epitomises non-caring, he does not give a ****. He's basically waiting for the public to reject him - we haven't. What a nuclear word removed

 

[HanoiVillan]

She's still wanging on about setting up an office whose main role will be to prevent a hypothetical Labour government from carrying out its spending plans:

It's also very Not Promising that this new office is being sold via a completely fictitious number, made up out of thin air, that is just not the actual cost of test and trace. 

[blandy]

1 hour ago, HanoiVillan said:

She's still wanging on about setting up an office whose main role will be to prevent a hypothetical Labour government from carrying out its spending plans:

It's also very Not Promising that this new office is being sold via a completely fictitious number, made up out of thin air, that is just not the actual cost of test and trace. 

I don't think so. I can't see tweets properly on this computer, but I think it's pretty smart. The bit I can see says

Quote

I care about stopping waste because I respect taxpayers and I respect our public services.

That's why Labour would create an independent Office for Value for Money, to crack down on the waste that has been so rampant under this Tory government

I think people generally know that there's been a huge amount of syphoning money to various PPE and other companies that were done via a "VIP lane" and resulted in huge amounts of money being wasted. I think people also know that track and trace has not be efficient or good value for money. Far from it. In all aspects, really the government(s) waste huge amounts of cash. HS2, PPE, infrastructure stuff generally, all kinds of procurement contracts and all the rest of it. This government in particular has been extraordinarily wasteful.

An office for money saying "we don't view a 20 million contract to deliver PPE googles to the NHS awarded top Matt Hancock's pub landlord is value for money" is not the same as an office for money saying "we don't think the government should procure PPE". It wouldn't stop anything, only (hope to) eleiminate some waste and cronyism before it happens, not once it's too late.

[OutByEaster?]

I think there's a difference between 'waste' and 'theft'. I'd like them to be pursuing the Tory's on the latter rather than the former.

I guess there's a fear that in using the word waste, you end up tying yourself in knots trying to fight percieved waste and make normal spending difficult when the problem was a theft you left unchallenged.

Hopefully in this case, the word waste is a pretty broad term.

[blandy]

14 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I think there's a difference between 'waste' and 'theft'. I'd like them to be pursuing the Tory's on the latter rather than the former.

Well, yes, obviously. The difficulty is that there's no (in legal terms) theft gone on. At worst ministers may be found to have "acted unlawfully" if there ever comes to be a reckoning for them. The Good Law project is trying to dig out all these dodgy deals and expose them, but in more general terms if a "body" can be appointed to look at stuff before the contracts are signed, then I don't see the principle as being anything other than a potential for good/better government spending. The politicians can still decide on I dunno "it is our policy to provide free broadband for every home" for example, but a "body" looking at the quotes from "JRM Cayman Islands (est. 2021)" and from "The Islington Allotment internet co-operative (registered charity)"  might be able to determine better value for money than the decision which might be reached by Robert Buckland or Liz Truss - or their future Labour equivalents.

[bickster]

19 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I think there's a difference between 'waste' and 'theft'. I'd like them to be pursuing the Tory's on the latter rather than the former.

I guess there's a fear that in using the word waste, you end up tying yourself in knots trying to fight percieved waste and make normal spending difficult when the problem was a theft you left unchallenged.

Hopefully in this case, the word waste is a pretty broad term.

No theft has taken place, what the Tories have done with the COVID PPE contracts is not illegal. It's morally reprehensible, it's many things but not illegal. They've followed the procurement rules they themselves put in place, they are the government and emergency legislation was passed

[OutByEaster?]

@blandyOh aye, I get that, but it's a body that's set up to deal with a problem that hasn't worsened, as a reaction to a bunch of criminals.

It's a positive thing to look to fight waste in public spending, I just think it's a little bit mislabelled - this Tory government haven't been rampantly wasteful, they don't want to waste anything, they want as much of it as possible to get into their own pockets.

 

[bickster]

Just now, OutByEaster? said:

Oh aye, I get that, but it's a body that's set up to deal with a problem that hasn't worsened, as a reaction to a bunch of criminals.

It's a positive thing to look to fight waste in public spending, I just think it's a little bit mislabelled - this Tory government haven't been rampantly wasteful, they don't want to waste anything, they want as much of it as possible to get into their own pockets.

 

They have to call it waste or similar because it's not illegal

And waste is quite a good word to use because it absolutely shuts the door on that avenue of attack on Labour because the public perception was always that Labour wasted money not the Tories (the reality is very different to perception.) If they keep pushing the wasteful Tories line it will sink in because everyone knows it's true, there's no hiding from it now. The defence from the Tories always used to be "But Labour would be worse", that line is less and less credible now.

It's not as much about what the policy will do (well it is a bit) but it's also about what the line also prevents coming back at them

[OutByEaster?]

Just now, bickster said:

They have to call it waste or similar because it's not illegal

And waste is quite a good word to use because it absolutely shuts the door on that avenue of attack on Labour because the public perception was always that Labour wasted money not the Tories (the reality is very different to perception.) If they keep pushing the wasteful Tories line it will sink in because everyone knows it's true, there's no hiding from it now. The defence from the Tories always used to be "But Labour would be worse", that line is less and less credible now.

It's not as much about what the policy will do (well it is a bit) but it's also about what the line also prevents coming back at them

Surely the opposite is true - in the unlikely event that Labour get back into power while people remember this - doesn't it open them up to accusations of waste?

If there's a remnant of public perception that associates waste with Labour, and the party then set up a body that's about countering waste, and give it enough teeth to annoy the Tory's, you can bet your bottom dollar that the Tory's will use it to pick on every single bit of spending that Labour do.

I don't think people connect 'waste' with the Tories, I think the Labour party should be attacking 'cronyism' or some other nice word for theft, that's the thing people are angry about, the Good Law Project are miles ahead of the actual opposition on this and it's almost bizarre that the party aren't pursuing and highlighting it.

We have the gentlest opposition in living memory and the worst government. 

 

[bickster]

11 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

it's almost bizarre that the party aren't pursuing and highlighting it.

Why haven't you noticed them doing it?

Those were the first two Labour MPs I searched, I'm sure you could find many more (My MP and another prominent Merseyside one)

The Labour Party themselves and not individual MPs have been saying it for a long time too

 

[OutByEaster?]

[bickster]

4 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

[HanoiVillan]

1 hour ago, blandy said:

I don't think so. I can't see tweets properly on this computer, but I think it's pretty smart. The bit I can see says

I think people generally know that there's been a huge amount of syphoning money to various PPE and other companies that were done via a "VIP lane" and resulted in huge amounts of money being wasted. I think people also know that track and trace has not be efficient or good value for money. Far from it. In all aspects, really the government(s) waste huge amounts of cash. HS2, PPE, infrastructure stuff generally, all kinds of procurement contracts and all the rest of it. This government in particular has been extraordinarily wasteful.

An office for money saying "we don't view a 20 million contract to deliver PPE googles to the NHS awarded top Matt Hancock's pub landlord is value for money" is not the same as an office for money saying "we don't think the government should procure PPE". It wouldn't stop anything, only (hope to) eleiminate some waste and cronyism before it happens, not once it's too late.

The problem with the idea that this is smart politics is that we are now more than 18 months into the pandemic, the grifting of contracts has been extremely obvious to anyone who cared to look, and the abundant evidence is that normal voters don't give two shits about it. You can be disappointed in that, but the CONS are posting over 40% in every poll. There's no evidence of mass anger about PPE contracts in the way there clearly was over MPs expenses back in the day.

This new office is not something normal people will ever learn about, in precisely the same way normal people don't care about the NAO or the OBR, these are just quangos/technocratic institutions that only high-engagement voters and insiders care about. This office will/would provide zero real opportunities for Labour; however, to whatever limited extent it had any impact, it would serve as yet another block on the Treasury authorising new spending. Its practical function will be to (further) institutionalise austerity.

(Of course this might be exactly what Reeves wants)

Edited October 26, 2021 by HanoiVillan