Keir starmer is dead in the water

[Bertiebiscuit]

The UK cannot have a prime minister who gave a plum job to a man when all the time he knew that Mandelson was still close friends with an ex-con who was convicted for trafficking children for sexual abuse. Starmer is destroying the reputation of the UK, he is an embarrassment and shoukd resign, if not the Labour party should demand his resignation.

The gay community regard it as offensive. It’s unfortunately often used to describe underage boys, and tries to confer bland on them, conveniently for some. Just don’t.

Anyway …

The gay community would be better off exposing abusers like Mandelson.

Coz that doesn’t exist - people fitting that description don’t want to be PM!

Why do you think that, out of interest?

If you tax wealthy too much they will just move to another country where the taxes are lower. Dont you get that ?

Food security is important. We cant keep importing all our food from far off countries.

VAT shouldnt be paid on education either. Education is not a luxury item.

Also, if/when KS leaves and a leadership challenge begins, I think the following MPs will all throw their hats in the ring to be leader: Wes Streeting, Bridget Phillipson, Jess Phillips, David Lammy, Shabana Mahmood and Yvette Cooper. I think WS will win and SM will come second.

Larry the cat ?

Couldn’t agree more - our first Purr-rime Meow-nister and the best one yet 🥰

Private education IS a luxury item. There is state education which is not a luxury. When you’re paying for a service for which there is a free at source alternative that is the very definition of luxury. It’s just not something regular people can afford to do, the wealthy people who can afford it (regardless of how many holidays you have to sacrifice to pay for it) are buying a higher level of service than is available to others.

I feel very sorry for those kids who were attending schools where parents were paying for their education then couldnt afford it once VAT was introduced. Then they had to leave and find another school. I gather SEND pupils were in particukar difficulty as scarcity of places available in state schools.

FT

One option being discussed by some MPs is a delegation of Labour select committee chairs being sent to tell Starmer his time is up. “He’s a decent man and he might be persuaded to see that it’s not working,” said one MP.

The problem, as one Labour official observed, is that nobody can be sure who would win the contest. “The left hate Wes and the right can’t stand Angela or Ed [Miliband, energy secretary].”

One Labour MP said Starmer’s leadership was “over and done”, adding: “The only questions left are when, how and how painful.”

Thats not the definition of a luxury. Just because there is a state alternative. Education is valued for education's sake as it being seen as a good thing of itself. Hence why few countries tax it.

Awful spiteful policy that has ended up costing money and leading to the closure of schools.Bridget Phillipson obviously thought we had far too many school places in the country that didnt cost the taxpayer anything and we needed a bit of a cull.

Yes, and the promised 6,500 new state school teachers was a load of old bollocks, as most of us predicted.

A vicious policy from Labour.

Agree. It’s the hypocrisy. Highly unlikely a domestic abuse, anti-VAWG or children’s charity would appoint as a director someone who the public knew had stayed in contact with a notorious convicted sexual offender against girls. How could they justify it?

Labour manifesto has a whole section, and targets, on tackling violence against women and girls. Gov published their VAWG strategy at the end of last year. It commits to tackling the root causes: surely one is not taking it seriously.

BBC now reporting:

No 10 sources said Sir Keir asked Lord Mandelson to address three specific questions, which were sent to him via email by the prime minister's chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney.

These questions were: why has he continued contact with Epstein after he was convicted? Why was he reported to have stayed in one of Epstein's homes while the financier was in prison? And was he associated with a charity founded by Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell that the financier had backed?

This suggests Starmer was willing to accept there could be a legitimate reason for a prospective high-profile ambassador to keep in touch with the world’s most notorious, convicted paedophile, accused of sex trafficking women. In his view, it wasn’t the contact that was the problem, it was the extent of the contact. This was after seeing the public outcry at the former Prince continuing contact.

How does that tackle the root causes of VAWG? If a PM has the attitude of: ‘It’s OK to be in contact with the most notorious assaulter/abuser of women, as long as it’s not too much’.

Don't you think relieving the state of the cost of educating your child should be enough, without having to pay extra tax for the privilege?

It's usually an offensive activity on the part of the service purchasers. I won't stop using it, the alternative is too much of a mouthful. Everyone understands it.

Can I ask what you propose instead?

Confer bland on them. What does that newspeak word tomato (too few words for a word salad) even mean?

I think that is the key point - what were those valid reasons? I can't think of any that I would accept to be a close associate of a prolific sex offender into office.

Abuse victims? Underage boys are can no more be prostitutes than Epsteins victims were "rent girls".

For the hard of thinking it is clearly a typo of blame.

In relation to the Starmer story, for example, it wasn't about underage boys, but young Ukrainian men.

Doesn't work. Abuse victims covers everything from stranger rape to apparently completely willing victims who are unaware that they've been groomed.

That is obvious now you've pointed it out but I'm so used to reading meaningless word salad in relation to social issues that it wasn't obvious to me at the time.

It wasn't obvious to me, either. Clarity matters if you want to make yourself understood. Don't bland us for your typos!