Well? Jeremy Hunt - thoughts?

[mamabear715]

I can't believe how politician-like he is, compared to Liz Truss!
Happy enough with the changes on the whole, what do you think?

Just thought I'd leave that there ....

How can they have “costed their energy price cap plan to the penny” if they don’t know what is going to happen to energy prices in the future?

Quite like Jermy Hunt, so startlingly coherent compared to Truss and Johnson, but durrly we deserve more than ‘cigerent and not an idiot’? He has no mandate. Truss was ‘elected’ (dodgy tho that process is) on the promise of certain policies. Those policies turned out to be idiotic and are in the bin. So now no one had a mandate. Which means this country is not currently being run as a democracy.

#nomandate

petition.parliament.uk/petitions/619781

How can they have “costed their energy price cap plan to the penny” if they don’t know what is going to happen to energy prices in the future?

Because they’ve linked it to taxation of energy providers. If the energy price goes up, the tax take increases to match. The higher the price, the higher the tax.

OMG, really?

I think you misunderstand me. I’ve never voted Tory before, have a Labour Party membership and will be voting Labour in the next general election unless by some twist of fate I move to another constituency where another left-wing party have a better chance of beating the tories.

I wasn’t talking about what labour would do differently from the tories, I was talking about what a Labour government with a huge majority will do differently to one with a more modest majority. I want labout to win, I just don’t think any party should have a majority that huge.

I think it’s a good thing that Hunt seems to be stabilising things a bit. I’m not worried that the tories will win the next election, I think that ship has sailed, but we’re stuck with them for the next two years and I think Hunt is what’s needed to calm things down for now and prevent a total collapse of the economy,

Though I’m no fan of Hunt, how refreshing to hear someone articulate answers to questions, after years of Boris and now Truss scrambling around for the script, or sound bites or deflection. They set a low bar I know, but you sense the adults are back in the room.

(Tories will lose the next election regardless - the only question is how many seats they hold on to)

Well, truss has just announced that she will lead the party into the next general election…. Make of that what you will…

As for “the tories are going out regardless,” I really wouldn’t be so sure.

They won’t call an election now because they know they’re going to lose as things currently stand.

But it’s estimated that the electorate have a 2 year memory.

If things stabilise over the next two years it’s not inconceivable that the tories could win.

Hunt is a snake who will relish the opportunity to deliver the "difficult decisions" that are on the horizon" with a manic glint in his eye. Talking about "viewing the vulnerable through the prism of compassion." Do me a favour, he's a monster.

How low is the bar when the sound of an egregious cunt of the first water makes people feel relieved?

This is what Johnson, Truss and Kwarteng have done.

Hunt is a dangerous man, with form:

www.opendemocracy.net/en/jeremy-hunt-tory-leadership-boris-johnson-nhs-junior-doctors/

Liebig
The important thing is that he's acquiesced to The Markets™ and we're now fully back on the austerity path that keeps the global money makers happy.

I'm pretty bemused by Labour and their supporters' response to the electoral calculus too. If they come in with a landslide, what, exactly, are they going to do different?

This.

The "markets" now know exactly what they have to do to force an austerity agenda on any government. Let's not forget that a balanced budget means spending cuts.

The reason the markets can do this ^ is because we have a huge trade deficit. This means we have to borrow money from external investors every week to keep the country and currency afloat.

The reason for that is Brexit, which quadrupled the trade deficit. 2% deficit wasn't great. 8% is a fucking disaster. Obviously many things have negatively affected the UK economy in the last couple of years - as they have many countries around the world - but this ^ is the primary reason it's so much worse here, and is one thing that politicians DO have the power to change. Anybody fancy a 5-6% instant increase in GDP? Brexit is costing the UK economy £800ml to £1bn per week. Think what difference that money could make. It's far more than we spend on the whole education budget...

The first thing any competent politician put in charge of our country would do is to rejoin the single market. As quickly as they possibly can.

He’s about 3/10 in terms of credibility and ability.

its only a step forward from the 0/10 that is truss.

that said, it’s definitely a step forward.

There is a reason the Tories only ever mention the debt: they can then use that to "justify" cuts.

The question should be why are we in so much debt? Why can the markets tell politicians what to do? The answer is the trade deficit. They absolutely do not want anybody to understand that or they will realise just how screwed over they've been and how we are literally importing inflation because we import so many essential goods and don't export enough to offset that. No amount of austerity will fix that. How anybody thought it was a good idea to leave the single market when you import such a huge % of essentials like food and fuel is beyond me.

Economics needs to be on the national curriculum, from primary onwards. I do wonder how many people in a random poll would even know what the trade deficit is? Everyone recently going on about "the markets" with seemingly scant idea what that means. Yet many of these people voted to leave the EU without bothering to learn about this. 🤯🤦‍♀️

Now that he's effectively PM, it might be a good idea to start investigating private health insurance. (Unless you've got a chronic condition or need emergency assistance, in which case forget it, private healthcare won't touch you unless you can afford huge premiums.)

Cancelling the reintroduction of Tax Free shopping plans is a massively short sighted mistake. Now people are travelling again the UK will be way down on the list of countries to visit for those who like to shop, the wealthy Chinese, Middle Eastern, American, Asian tourists will be swayed towards Paris or Milan instead. Yes they’ll still potentially visit the UK but the major spending will be done in Europe.

Hopefully the next government changes this otherwise the retail landscape will become even more grim than it is.

Hunt is a Grown up in the room. Mordaunt, too.
I don't like their policies, but they are not idealogues like Kwarteng/Truss.

I like Raynor a lot, rough diamond and all. Am pretty sure the main thing people dislike about AR is her accent. Raynor is a hugely better speaker than Truss, has buckets of integrity unlike Johnson, has genuine warmth unlike May.

All politicians tell their story, how many times has Truss said she grew up in Leeds, how many times has Hunt said he was an 'entrepreneur'?

I'm not cheered by Hunt, he just looks good by comparison IMO, the Tories have fucked this country up, and should not be allowed to govern now as they have no mandate for this chaos and can't unify.

I just hope that sooner or later we get a change of government. Because Hunt will use this as an excuse to sell every fucking thing that isn't screwed to the floor, and downgrade eveything else.

These planned investment zones are awful - they are going to throw every environmental regulation, workers' rights etc on a big bonfire.

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

And poles are notoriously unreliable

I think it's a bit much to blame Polish people for our current predicament.

Or was that a Freudian slip?

I couldn't agree more. I feel like weeping when I think of the sheer waste of money the whole Brexit endeavour has entailed, not to mention the ongoing cost to the economy.

Compared to the current shit show, it does feel like a grown up has finally entered the room but that isn't saying much about his competence.

This in spades

I thought he did well today. Hopefully things will settle down now.

It's shocking, and almost all of the UK political mess is a direct follow on from that. The cost on day one was in the tens of billions. The instant devaluation of GBP and our ongoing problems plus then these deliberate trade barriers meaning inflation spirals and businesses fold and jobs vanish and wages plummet.

The "Conservative" solution? More austerity! Absolutely insane. Why millions of people are not lobbying their MPs to tell them to rejoin the single market is beyond me. Many of the problems we face right now are external. Many of them can be mitigated to some extent in the long-term (and should have been, by competent Governments with some foresight, decades ago, like energy and food security). However, we knew a pandemic was overdue. No planning or preparation. We knew Russia was unstable and the 2014 invasion of Crimea was a signal of intent, why no action on energy then, knowing our exposure to global markets?

We knew the situation was precarious in 2016 yet decided to screw ourselves over and be in the weakest position possible to weather the storm. Why?

And now that there is a simple solution staring everyone in the face that will not fix everything but will make everything a lot better than it is now, no politician on either side has the guts to say it.

None of them deserve anybody's vote until they do.