Thread 11 Starmer: Will that Phone Call Be To Harris or to Trump? (the decidedly superior looking cats thread)

[BIossomtoes]

New thread.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/5195566-thread-10-starmer-first-female-chancellor-delivers-the-budget?page=40&reply=139578573

If that was going to work then the Conservatives would have won the election. So they have to do something else.

I wonder if the reason there’s no shadow deputy leader is because nobody wanted it. It wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of them are frit at the prospect of facing Rayner across the dispatch box. She seemed to quite like Dowden and was quite gentle with him, I don’t imagine she’d take the same approach now with someone else.

Dowden and Rayner are friends. The idea that politicians with opposing beliefs also dislike each other is generally wrong. The knockabout stuff is for party members who are usually vastly more vociferous about ideology than the people elected, who ultimately have to work with each other day to day.

Badenoch is absolutely a membership choice in that respect. She is punchy with her own colleagues and pretty unclubbable. Whether she gets the loyalty of her shadow cabinet is yet to be seen.

Dowden and Rayner are friends. The idea that politicians with opposing beliefs also dislike each other is generally wrong.

In mathematics, there can be more than one method to solve a problem. (I mention this as I have just seen a YT maths puzzle that I solved completely differently to the poster).

Whether that is a metaphor for life is another matter.

https://x.com/GeorgeWParker/status/1854844584964063478

Jonathan Powell, Blair's former chief of staff and architect of the Good Friday Agreement, back in No10 as Starmer's National Security Adviser. Big beefing up of the Downing St operation.

Just look at Bonnie Greer in this clip

https://x.com/implausibleblog/status/1854843542423662968

Fiona Bruce, "What about Donald Trump's tariffs that will affect the UK?"

Conservative MP, Matt Vickers, "We have a special relationship"

Fiona Bruce, "So no tariffs?"

Matt Vickers, "Labour need to deliver free trade with the US to ensure those tariffs don't happen in our special relationship"

So we have a special relationship, it's just not special enough to exempt us from tariffs

We have NO special relationship with the US. The sooner people understand that the better. Trump isn't interested in us in the slightest unless we can do something for him and it won't be reciprocal

Those memorandums of understanding that Badenoch so proudly announced will mean fuck all

I think it’s fairly uncomplicated because Trump wants very high tariffs on Chinese goods. He will want the support of other countries on that.

Britain should negotiate a free trade agreement with the US. The Conservatives didn’t manage this but it would give the UK preferential treatment in tariff terms. It would lock in the rates and mean no messing with the general WTO rate.

Trump is asking the world to pick a side in trade. US or China. That’s how he sees it.

I can see KB needing a Tory grandee to boost her credibility but I have no respect for IDS. He was directly responsible for the introduction of Universal Credit and insisted on including Housing Benefit as part of it. This meant tenants would have to pay their own rent (before, it had been paid direct to landlords). This was in spite of civil servants telling him this would mess up the rental market by creating uncertainty. Section 21 (and the huge increase in homelessness we're seeing today) was the indirect result so he can jog on as far as I'm concerned.

https://x.com/implausibleblog/status/1854863581747265890

Kim Darroch, "I think Trump will introduce tariffs"

Faisal Islam, "What is the UK's strategy?"

Kim Darroch, "The US might offer a free trade deal.. It will be like the 2017 deal.. It will destroy British agriculture.. The only place to go is to line up with the European Union"

Faisal Islam, "Trump's got a thing about the EU"

Kim Darroch, "He says the EU is worse than China"

Faisal Islam, "This opens up Brexit which the Labour party have parked and try to forget about"

John Ryley, "Labour are going to find it difficult"

I think saying Labour have ‘parked’ Brexit sounds like they are being blamed for that - it’s not a problem they can do much about at the moment, or at all until the Tories also want to. The EU won’t renegotiate anything if they think a future government will want it all to go back. Waste of their time.
It’s definitely going to be difficult though.

Starmer painted himself into a corner by saying there would be no rejoin, or even a referendum.

As far as I can see, his only way out would be a referendum on the Single Market/Customs Union, which, and I could be wrong, hasn't specifically been ruled out. And, of course, it wouldn't actually be rejoin...

The Exploding Heads...

https://x.com/Exploding_Heads/status/1854898373209243995

To paraphrase a certain M. Gove:

"I think the public have had quite enough of referendums"

Even easier then, just join the SM & CU, no referendum required...

But there can’t be any rejoin. It’s not a corner Starmer has made. The EU simply wouldn’t consider it unless the Tories were also on board. They won’t consider anything else either, for the same reason - why waste time in negotiation and adjusting relationships when the next government could be Tory and want to go back to as we were?
It’s a non starter because it’s not up to us. I really want to be back in, but until the Tories come to their senses it’s off the table.

No referendum required anyway. But it’s not easy, as I’ve said above.

Incidentally, "Our mate Phil" had an interesting suggestion to deal with Farage.

Rather than dismissing his kind offer to be an intermediary between the US and UK, Keir should have welcomed him with open arms and made him responsible to getting the best deal possible for the UK and it's companies, customers and public services. And despatch him with instructions not to return until he has done it. He'd have to give up being an MP sadly, but that's small beer compared to replicating his barnstorming fishing deal for the UK when he was an MEP.

In the interests of transparency the offer letter and replies should be published. Would hate for Nigel to feel he was being take out of context.

Re Brexit and the EU, I wish people would accept it for what it is, and start to work towards a better future We may not be part of the EU, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with keeping our standards on a par, or higher so that future agreements are easier.

As a society, we deserve those high standards and should hold future governments to them.

It feels as though the world is about to become partisan, with less stability, as alliances break and change.

The reality of Brexit - as delivered by the Tories - is it was about dropping standards.

Exactly. We want higher standards, not lower. The tories didn't understand this, preferring to seize an opportunity for an old fashioned land grab (or the taxes of the many for the few).Just one of the many reasons they are no longer the government in control.

Labour have a chance to do better- I hope they take it

Meanwhile, it looks like the German coalition government has collapsed. Interesting times.

Sadly JRM sold it on that very point - we would be free post Brexit to ditch all those terrible EU laws and standards.

An element of that is on ourselves being laissez-faire about explaining the regulations to the Great British Public. Which considering we speak the most common language in the history of mankind seems a bit odd.

Hence the fairy stories about bananas were allowed to fester.

Out of all the developments in the past four months, the only concrete one I can see is the sinking of the "let's do everything in roods" campaign.

Speaking of which - slight digression - enjoyed Taskmaster on Thursday. When the word "furlong" was mentioned, I found myself saying "eighth of a mile" before I realised it. God alone knows how that got lodged into my tiny brain, let alone how it was triggered so immediately.

Of course it then helps to know a mile is 1760 yards which gives you 220 yards.

Returning to the point, it was painfully embarrassing how many people who wanted to go back to imperial knew fuck all about it. People older than me guessing what a hundredweight is. It was almost as if they had no idea what they were really asking for.

Fancy that now ?!