Council Elections

[OneTealShaker]

The first declared seats going to Reform.

Reform +2
Labour -1

Buckle up people.

what do you think socialism is?

I'm also in a Reform led councils with big majority and lots of potholes near to me have been fixed. The roads have smooth tarmac now. Still more to do but a big improvement.

I moved to the area I live last year and I am shocked to find out I now have a reform councillor .I had lent my vote to Green in this election and they did well but just not well enough to take the seat .I would never vote Tory but they had done ok in this area and I would rather they kept the seat .

I want more growth and more business opportunities.

I would just like a government that understands that all businesses start small and that doesn't assume that employment rights/HR is the first priority. Small business needs to find a footing before it's barraged by compliance demands. Many years ago, Dh's small enterprise advertised for an admin person, initially part time. That role has grown with the business, and the successful candidate is about to become a director of the company, probably the MD. But SHE had completed her family and was not about to take mat leave break, but there were still difficult child care days and weeks, and we coped fine.

Of course, it's totally necessary, but it is much more difficult to manage and ride in SMEs without any depth of staffing. There is no number 2 being trained up to take over so the responsibility goes back to the founder of the company . Small companies can only afford one person to do one job. The founder picks up most of everything else, because the company is their baby.

Birmingham became bankrupt because they seriously fucked up. They did not pay women equally to men. The judge ordered the council to repay the women and it bankruptrd them. Nothing to do with government funding otherwise all councils would have gone bankrupt.

@EdithBond @FinallyGotToo - no i’m not in Worcestershire
@EdithBond - I was simply answering a question as to why they are popular… I didn’t vote Reform in the GE as I don’t think they would be any better and I do a lot of research before voting. My post wasn’t about making my life better, it was about being sick and tired of constantly being squeezed in the middle and anyone who isn’t on the ‘left’ being accused of racism!

Chat GPT not serving you well there

Committing to net zero immigration would be a start. As in the Conservatives or Labour committing to that aim.

Ok I know you don’t say this but it sounds like you’re suggesting small businesses should be exempted for the rules that ensure workers are paid fairly and their health and safety is protected. Appreciate the difficulties for small businesses but not having employment rights as a priority is bonker!

That is just half the problem. But the important thing is that they will not solve it either. They are rage-baiting people into getting votes. What boggles the mind is that people experienced the extent of lies cooked up by Farage and co and yet, they fall for new ones. I am sorry, but that is just pure dumbness. No way around it. Everyone voting for them will deserve all the crap resulting from this, but unfortunately the rest of us is collateral damage too.

I’m keen to know too, but I won’t be holding my breath - Reform’s so-called Head of Policy (James Orr) was on Question Time a few weeks ago and couldn’t give any specifics on policy when questioned.

I am suggesting that very small businesses should not be held to exactly the same standards as big ones, except on health and safety. Obviously nobody knowingly sends employees into dangerous situations, but the rules that apply to our 4 person company are de facto the same as apply to BAe. We do pay similarly to them, because othe
rwise we'd have no operational people but we can offer greater flexibilty too.

I haven't RTFT but unless I'm being fucking basic here, I can't see how unless a person is:

• Retired and/or wealthy now and has no concerns about that position changing
• White and has no non-white family or friends
• Has no young children or does not care about the futures of their grown up children or grandchildren

Could possibly think that voting for Reform is good idea, because:

• They have pledged to bring in the Great Repeal Bill. They want to repeal workers' rights, which would weaken the protections for things like maternity pay, minimum wage, and rules against zero hour contracts and fire and rehire.
• They want to scrap the Equality Act. That would mean that all discrimination was no longer protected, including for women and maternity discrimination. Not just against brown people! They claim this is because white men are losing out due to the Equality Act being in place.
• They want to cut the minimum wage for younger workers, because it's "pointless".
• They want to remove all of the foreign workers who are currently the main group who are willing to care for the elderly in hospitals and care homes across the nation.
• They want to remove benefits and punish people for being disabled. There would definitely not be a two child benefit cap.
• They have promised Council Tax rises for every Council they control.

This is just scraping the surface. For anyone who voted Reform, please don't complain when it all goes tits up!

Are you including the £850 spent per week on housing each asylum seeker in hotels? Add on the £50 subsidy they receive and it's nigh on a grand EACH week for EACH asylum seeker. Not to mention additional costs such as transport, interpreters, dentists, drs...I'm certainly not a reform supporter, but this kind of gaslighting has got to stop. People are more than capable of googling the info for themselves.

@OneTealShaker Nope, not Chat GPT, just quick google search,
but happy to find the sources if you disbelieve me.
Here is the first- the inflation
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/inflation-cpi

It has got GRAPHS!

More on unemployment, cost of living etc.

https://www.newyorkfed.org/newsevents/news/research/2026/20260507

No doubt you will declare it “fake news” just like your idol.

I’m hoping the Reform voters on this thread will explain soon.

They must know more than their Head of Policy.

Sorry, intended to post separately rather than as a reply

It would be interesting to see how the Reform voters would feel about the content of this document. Yes, it has been written by a Union but it is essentially a deep dive into their words and their policies.

https://www.unison.org.uk/content/uploads/2026/04/Reform-UKs-policy-agenda-examined-UNISON.April-2026.pdf

Terrible idea.

Much better would be to insist big companies pay their taxes so the government can take these taxes and give some kind of start up loan to small business and they do things properly like everyone else. Next you’ll be saying small businesses should not have to employ women of child bearing age in case they get pregnant as they can’t afford the costs associated with maternity leave etc

Is it?
In everything there is differentiation surely.
Selling stuff at a school fete is different from selling stuff as a business. If eBay etc knows this, then so should government.

Employing your mate who knows she will off pregnant and is happy to help before she has kids, is completely different to someone joining a multi national company that might be her career.

Am so relieved that the high turnout in my area was to see off Reform…Faith in humanity has been restored!

I agree - although I despair of the idiots in nearby St Helens, and hope it severely bites them on the arse when their council tax goes up and all of their community services are closed!

Kulwinder54 · Yesterday 18:06
Where did all the green voters go

I wondered that as I thought Reform and Green were neck and neck.

I'm guessing you know that immigration has already halved over the last 18 months? They don't need to commit to that aim, we're already heading to negative net immigration by the end of this year.

Do you know how much net zero immigration will cost us? For every 100,000 fewer immigrants per year, we lose £7 billion. Why do you think reducing immigration to zero will solve our systemic problems? What problem is it solving if it's going to cost us more? Have you ever actually tested your assumption that the problems in our country are due to immigration, or do you just believe the stories pushed at us relentlessly through the media?

I can tell you, we will still have private equity companies bleeding us dry, privatised key industries fleecing us and pumping sh1t into our rivers, and deregulated corporations amassing trillions in wealth at our expense.

Excuse me, I didn’t call you a liar. Please remind me, links to my previous posts doing this are good, where I have”constantly attacked the person who has posted it and accused them of lying”.

I’ll wait….