Westminstenders: The only way forward is up.

[placemats]

A new thread as the other one is getting full. I'm enjoying the post election discussion. Every view is listened to and welcomed.

Brexit is happening, but what kind of Brexit will it be?

New leaderships for both Labour and the LibDems.

Most importantly, will Britain be Great in 2024?

I still don’t rate anyone else over KS though - apart from charisma issue which could be a problem. I look at the other candidates and can see the media giving them hell already.

Get rid of those committed to the job and hire in those committed to their paymasters. This is coming next

Who would want to be a civil servant if it gets politicised?

The nature of the Civil Service is that it's apolitical. At least, that's what years of watching Yes Minister told me.

"The policy might be awful but it's carried out incredibly well"

@AuldAlliance

I think you need a group of people who can work together to forge a new vision, sell it to the party and the country.

Thatcher and Blair had that.

Universities and their selection criteria have changed since 1974 when I started university. Easy to dismiss Bristol and Exeter as for Tim-Nice-But-Dim but that wasn't always so and Bath was only a poly then. A friend on the Aeronautical Engineering course at Bristol reckoned that 30% of students failed in each sequential year (you would hope the less good students weren't allowed to design passenger planes, wouldn't you, really?)

The year I applied for university, Oxbridge's prestige colleges hadn't opened their doors to women. So I applied where I did, Bristol, York, Warwick, Leeds and Cardiff (100% offer rate) which were then the MOST selective universities outside Oxford and Cambridge for my subject area. But had Balliol been open to my application, I would have applied, and done the seventh term.

I don’t think he’s thick but I’d be interested to see him up against Starmer

He’s not thick exactly, but he says and does some very stupid things.
I don’t think he would have got into Oxford if he hadn’t been at Eton.

He’s not very good when put on the spot.

I think you need a group of people who can work together to forge a new vision, sell it to the party and the country

I think as well that how Brexit and the next 5 years pan out will also make a massive difference to who wins the next election regardless of who the leader is.

And Angela Rayner "makes way" for RLB.

Do they think Labour lost because it wasn't sufficiently 'working class' or sufficiently 'northern'? It is depressingly simplistic and short sighted if they think that having a northern working class female leader is all that's needed to magically bring back the ex labour.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/dec/16/angela-rayner-rebecca-long-bailey-labour

So, it very much looks like a done deal: Rebecca Long-Bailey for Leader, Angela Rayner for Deputy.

https://amp.theguardian.com/politics/2019/dec/16/angela-rayner-rebecca-long-bailey-labour?CMP=sharebtnntw&twitterrimpression=true

No he’s not, surprisingly. He blusters. He’s better with a script or media briefing in his hand. Maybe from TV days.

I am pretty sure that Bath University was never a Poly.

It's not because she's Northern working class so much as that she's Corbyn's protege, DrBlackbird.

I’m more annoyed by a done deal than I am the election result. Fark.

No he’s not, surprisingly. He blusters. He’s better with a script or media briefing in his hand. Maybe from TV days

Now that he's going to get Brexit done, he's going to run out of soundbites.

It's all very well doing soundbites. But he will have to do some proper media interviews after Brexit and hopefully the MSM will scrutinise more.

I think as well that how Brexit and the next 5 years pan out will also make a massive difference to who wins the next election regardless of who the leader is.

That will be key.

So, it very much looks like a done deal: Rebecca Long-Bailey for Leader, Angela Rayner for Deputy.

That will be up to the membership

So, it very much looks like a done deal: Rebecca Long-Bailey for Leader, Angela Rayner for Deputy.

Jesus Christ. See you all in 2029 then.

If Labour are stupid enough to anoint a Corbyn protegee
they deserve the wilderness that is coming

I just wonder what we all did to deserve that ...

Lets see what happens at the PLP tomorrow night

Now that he's going to get Brexit done, he's going to run out of soundbites.

Yeah but no he won't. Who is his advisor?

In a former life I was a senior in the CS. The amount of times I had to hold my nose in the face of absolute idiots was immense.

But we gave them the options, drafted the legislation and off they went to get it through, or not.

Was never my problem. Was always thinking who is next here lol.

But CS are rarely given kudos for having to deal with total morons. Will direct you to Yes Minister for example. It is so true.

An independent CS is vital for democracy. If that changes we are totally FKN doomed.

Bath used to be a CAT I think.

I know, Marsha.

For a lot of the members of Labour, it is currently more important to have pure, 'correct' politics than to get into power.

It's as though politics is a kind of art form, and they are in a very avant-garde group.

Obviously, it's a terrible shame that their audience is small (but oh so discerning); they know that in twenty years time, people will 'get' it.

Sadly, for those of us who could rather do with a Labour government now ... well, we'll just have to make our own plans.

(And it goes without saying that there is something really dysfunctional about a Labour Party that wholly fails to connect with, and fundamentally slightly despised, whole swathes of the electorate.)

Then I guess she ticks all the boxes, northern, ex working class, and Corbyn protege. I guess it's understandable for Corbyn / any leader to want their influence to be felt after leaving in choosing a successor, but it seems dreadfully knee jerk. And wrong.

There's not even a credible moderate, middle path party either

Signs of madness

Re R L-B