To think Andy Burnham is doing a decent job so far?

God yes. It’s a nightmare trying to get children to do certain courses when their parents actively don’t want them to. Not a lot but some. It’s heartbreaking

According to governmental definitions, a large proportion of people actually live in "rural" areas, which often include large villages, small towns, etc. In theory such places, i.e. a small town with 10k inhabitants "should" have a good bus service but in reality, lots don't. "Rural" doesn't mean a sleepy little hamlet of half a dozen homes on a hillside! I live in a village of 7k people - we don't have a good bus service - no buses at all through the village centre, and a very sparse service along the by pass to one side of the village, with no evening buses and only 1 bus every two hours on Sundays. For 7K people! We used to have a service through the village centre but it was scrapped the same year that the local council closed the village library, 2005!

In our nearby city of around 50k people, they've just changed the route of the park n ride bus service so that it no longer goes to the city hospital on the edge of the city. The service was bad enough anyway, didn't start early enough nor finish late enough for the hospital shift workers, but now it's no use for "daytime hours" workers in the hospital either, nor for patients or visitors! Then the decision making pillocks wonder why roads in the area are suddenly congested with cars and why local residents can't park in their own streets anymore. As always with local politics, the decision makers havn't a clue about the reality and can't "foresee" the inevitable consequences of their decisions that everyone else could easily have forecast!

Funny that we have just lost our last bus service where I live then .....

Will public transport improvements not help you or your grandchildren? Will changes to social care not potentially help you? Will improving training for more trades people not help you?

Or are you harking back to Thatcher and how she gave tax cuts and sold off the family jewels - is that the kind of help you want. The kind of help that has screwed your grandchildren.

There are parents who prevent their children from doing an apprenticeship because they would lose their UC?

No

He has no mandate for any of his actions. If he had any integrity at all he would call an election.

Democracy is dead

AB has said he wants access to transport across all postcodes. It was Thatcher who privatised the bus services and demolished rural buses - typical Tory to forget that.
As someone who supports Labour I want everyone to be able to access public transport, I voted AB for mayor so he would do that in my area.

AB supporting devolution and devolving power to control transport to YOUR local area means, hopefully, you can vote for a party that will help with local transport issues. Devolution will mean you get a say in your local transport. If rural areas continue to vote for parties that don’t want public transport it won’t happen - Lib Dems, Greens, Labour all support local public transport.

Huh! I haven’t seen a single thing that’ll benefit me. But my DH and I brought up two children in a stable home, supported them through their education and training, never claiming anything but Child Benefit, with those two adults now working with children of their own, everyone always employed (albeit I’m now retired) all saving and doing everything we can to ensure our futures. Seems that’s not the way Labour believe it should be and we need be ready to have our success ripped away through taxation.

I would agree. Until I heard that he was reneging on his promise to support WASPI women, but to do something 'none monetary'. Whatever that means.

The vast majority of the population live in urban areas which have bus services surely? I’m rural, but whenever I go to a city or town, which is where most people live, I see lots of
buses.

Way too early - Ask again in 6 or 12 months (if he lasts that long) when there is (hopefully) a bit more substance to go off.

And he’s got nothing beyond a willing commitment from the Tories and LibDems. How well he actually exploits their input will be telling, as I’d imagine there will be different ideas than the more lefty Labour way might like.
I think all the rushing about means he’s putting up smoke to hide the fact he hasn’t really got a clue - but if he uses civil service advice and properly listens to those with knowledge and non-partisan interest he’d stand a chance. But then you could say that about the last umpteen PMs!

It'll be the 22nd time cross party talks have been held.
Cross - not all.

Nail on the head. We shouldn't have to bribe people to come off benefits.

Do not like the latest idea of paying parents on benefits £4500, if their children start apprenticeships. This is the cover for benefits lost when kids train for an apprenticeship. There are many on benefits who have never worked & have no intention of doing so. How about targeting these people for a change

Typical Labour attitude. "It benefits me so fuck everyone else."

As I wrote quite clearly, the vast majority of people have no access to the buses you're so fond of. Bit unpleasant that you're not more concerned about that. But hey, so long as you save a few pennies, that's the main thing.

Yes, same as he's done with everything else he's talked about. It's all fur coat and no knickers. He talks a good talk, but we need actions not words.

Cross party involvement is what led us to the £100 BILLION wasted on HS2!

Hasn't Kemi said she'll only be involved with the social care changes if it's financed by cost savings rather than tax increases? That sounds like a non starter.

He's done nothing but moan and complain. He did that though the pandemic, which is possibly understandable considering he was from the opposing party - but then when his own party was voted in on a landslide, he continued to moan and complain. He completely undermined his own leader and has been plotting for months to oust him, whilst trying to convince other MPs to stab him the back. At no point did he ever swing in behind Starmer and attempt to do what's best for the party, and the country. Don't get me wrong, Starmer was useless - but he was voted in with a landslide, loudly promising stability. If I can respect that and support him, I think his own party should too. Instead, Burnham was slithering around doing all he could to grab the throne. Despite knowing he is definitely not who was voted for, his policies are not what was voted for, and if he had actually stood for election neither he nor his policies would have been voted in. As proved by all his previous attempts.

Furthermore, he completely abandoned the people who did vote him in as soon as he spied an opportunity to further himself, whilst handing the bill to the taxpayer. He has greatly overstated his success stories, whilst refusing to credit the people who actually put them in motion - or the predominantly Tory government who prioritised funding for it all. He has also refused to address his failures, of which there are very many, both as mayor and as an MP. He is wasting even more taxpayer money on setting up a home office, which nobody has asked for or voted for. He has offered absolutely no evidence that this will in any way benefit the country, and as far as I know he is not even bothering to do any research, or any exploration of other sites or options. He lives there, so that's where it's going. And we're paying.

His behaviour has been absolutely abysmal, and I suspect if it were a Tory behaving like this you would be the first to complain. We have already had one jumped-up, egomaniacal, power-hungry mayor - I really don't think we need another. Especially one who has demonstrated even worse morals.

The two big things he has announced were already being tackled by Starmer, who set up a Technical Excellence scheme for college last year. The first thing Reeves and Starmer did was Commission a report from Louise Casey on adult social care. You could argue that that is going over old territory as the Dilnot report on ASC was widely praised, but never adopted.

I do agree that these big reforms need to be consensual as nothing will work if every new government changes direction, but on the other hand nothing will be achieved in a 30 minute meeting either.

Burnham is every bit as shallow and clueless as I feared he would be

Exactly this. Continuously flip flopping between parties, with it being used as a political football and nothing ever getting sorted.

It’s everybody’s responsibility and previous governments have continuously shied away from that, putting their gain first. A complete dereliction of duty that needs to stop.

Nice speech on the social care situation but no solutions just we'll think about it for a bit. You'd think someone who first put forward proposals over 10 years ago might have some ideas.

No, he’s making it cross party because it’s a very long term project which will need years to get bedded down. Cross party involvement is an insurance policy against it getting scrapped with a change of government.

Scrapping the green taxes and cutting the carbon tax that artificially increase bills