Thread 51 Sunak: A William Hill to die on

[DuncinToffee]

Previoust thread

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5100698-thread-50-sunak-civil-war-what-civil-war?page=40&reply=136272126

10 days to go

Amanda voted Labour all her life - even as a Conservative councillor.

The debate was a lot of heat and light from Rishi Sunak - the net effect I think will be nothing. The UK has given up listening to the Conservatives. They are chasing Reform voters. But actually Sunak is less charming than Nigel Farage; Farage is better at being a politician than Sunak is (though it’s a low bar). If you had combined these two men in terms of skills (Sunak as an effective technocrat and Farage as politico) then Labour would have far greater challenges.

Sunak’s approach was to treat Starmer like he was already PM last night - more effective but also a tacit admission that he is going to lose. But he deserves to. That young woman stays with me. She is absolutely right and it’s people like her who absolutely need to believe that the UK is a good country that cares and supports the young. You can see them wavering. We have got this totally wrong because we need our young more than ever. And the one thing that was absolutely sick making last night was Sunak effectively declaring that he thought the UK was s good place to be because his parents had managed to pay for Winchester. Fuck that. It tells you everything about how limited the Conservatives are,

That’s so funny. 😆

Morning all.

8.19 am and I'm heartily sick of the coverage of last night's debate. The celebration of that rude guy who presumably thought he was being clever and daring by asking RS and KS why they're both rubbish. . How exactly is that helpful?

And the widespread ' agreement' that RS 'got' KS on the issue of migrants who are here waiting to have their case for asylum heard. Aha says RS shamelessly, there's a right mess that you can't quickly and easily sort and explain in a sound bite can you? Can you? Gotcha.

Eh, while ignoring the fact that this is the result of conservative government failings. And that their so called plan is illegal and will only apply to a tiny minority of migrants.

I couldn't even face it last night. Turned other on. Rishi was shouting petulantly. Turned it off again. Will be interested what the viewing figures were. I doubt it's going to make any difference at this point - especially not with the betting fiasco in the background

From the BBC:

Another snap poll was conducted by More In Common, this time with 1,525 respondents.

That gave Starmer the victory, with 56% saying the Labour leader won, and 44% saying Sunak did - though 30% said the prime minister performed better than expected, compared to 19% saying the same for the Labour leader.

😂
Think that shows the very low expectations for Sunak and is his problem all over. All the campaigning in the world won't change the fact people believe him and the Tories to be a shit government.
Chickens coming home to roost.

Happy belated birthday wishes @L1ttledrummergirl 🎂

Well… I agree it won’t make a difference. The Conservatives are desperate not to lose any more votes to Reform. Fraser Nelson has just written a good article about the real fears of the Conservatives and it’s not a one term Labour Party. It’s a Labour Party with a huge majority that can’t be unpacked in a decade, that can change matters to suit itself, and now even less legal fetters in place thanks to Boris Johnson who smashed every constitutional limit going. Yes I would be worried if I were them. The final cherry on top was legislating without ECHR sign off. Or legislating to crush protest. How do the Conservatives feel now when they realise that it will be Labour who will have those powers?

I am glad to see the back of these TV debates. Who can shout the loudest and score the most points in a school debating contest is not an indicator of leadership or governmental competence.

I was listening to one of the political podcasts yesterday saying that the ratings for the debates have been so low they might not bother next time round. Good.

Yes, I found that man smug and rude too. My hackles raised when his objection to Starmer was that he was being ' controlled by senior Labour figures'. Very DM.

He was interviewed afterwards, still looking smug. Lifelong Tory voter. Obviously. I suspect a Boris fan.

I could have scripted a better answer than KS gave, mind.

To be honest, given the quality of some Conservative MPs and their level of thinking ability it is perfectly believable for me that a Conservative councillor would be a life long Labour voter.

Heck there is one that when he walked into a room, wasn't able to observe there were more than 5 other people present having food and one might say partying.

Thank you for the solidarity. Yes, Mr Rude cited his concerns as inheritance tax and having to get an electric car. I mean poor guy, I feel so sorry for him - what a difficult life he has. He's debating whether to vote conservative or reform isn't he?

Today is the 11th! time junior doctors are on strike

That was the quiet bit not said out loud, yes.

He was a complete tosser. Must be nice for your concerns not to be whether you'll be able to pay your rent or whether your children will go hungry that week.

It’s beyond me why people his and my age care about inheritance tax, we’ll be dead if and when our estates need to pay it. Equally we’re likely to be dead before all cars have to be electric. If we’re going to be concerned about what happens beyond our lifetimes there are far bigger issues to worry about.

He got my back up. If the BBC are going to get audience feedback at least get a diverse range of views.

Can't remember source but I read somewhere recently that a huge number of people just don't know the IHT thresholds partly because the nil rate band on the primary residence make calculating it fairly complex. But only 2% of estates are even liable for it.

In principle I am opposed to abolishing it as it's a progressive wealth tax. But it means the ultra wealthy tie their estates up in such knots maybe there is an efficiency argument. Not sure.

https://x.com/LukeTryl/status/1806221418964684997

As well as asking people their top election issues we asked people this week if politicians were talking too much or too little about those issues. Interestingly debates about transgender people were the only issue where more said it was talked about too much than too little.

The question the rude guy asked (that are the two men really the best on offer ) was a reasonable one , but the context that he gave was completely out of order: conspiracy theorist and loaded with judgement

I agree that he might (as he apparently claimed afterwards) still be undecided but leaning towards the Conservatives but he's actually undecided but leaning towards the Conservatives.

On the immigration point, they were both guilty of concentrating on the "boats" (many of whom might actually be legitimately claiming asylum) rather than legitimate immigration as a whole - which is 10 times larger than the numbers on the boats

Last year, c1.6 million people came to the UK, and c500,000 left the UK, with a net migration figure of 685,000. Boat crossings amounted to c50,000 - I'm not sure they're even included in these figures

And that's before you even get into why the legitimate immigrants came here (spoiler: we needed them ) and what immigrants can offer (spoiler: pre the EU referendum, analysis showed that EU immigrants were net contributors to the economy ). How else are we going to grow the economy? Growing the economy will itself help reduce the tax load.

It’s not particularly complex. The threshold for a couple with one residence is £1 million and IHT is payable only on anything above that. Quite honestly if our kids were unhappy with a tax free windfall of £250k we haven’t bestowed great values on them.

One week to go!

Have to admit, even being interested in politics I haven’t watched any of the debates. There do seem to be a ridiculous number of them.

Wow!
https://www.electoralcalculus.co.uk/homepage.html

Not very happy at all about Reform
Fingers crossed for a lib dem opposition

Also this video for those on TwiX. Poor old Tommy 😂
https://x.com/carolvorders/status/1805592279840670037

Who’d ever have thought having 71 seats would make a party the official opposition? That’s wild.