Westminstenders: The Mask is Slipping

[RedToothBrush]

This week has seen the department of the Chancellor who launched a 50p piece, the serious contemplation of a tin pot bridge, the rebirth of eugenics as a subject for cabinet, the announcement of the end of the BBC as we know it, the cabinet chanting after the PM in a way Orwell would be proud of, suppression of a report into trade deals which dares to mention the effect of distance and geography, worrying signs of an ever growing rift with Europe over negotiations for a deal, an appointment which starts to make our membership of the ECHR look very dodgy and there have been rather a lot of floods which so far seemed to have escaped the attention of those in London busy in their own swamp.

It's becoming apparent very quickly just how Trump like our new government are and how they want the UK to emulate the very worst aspects of America.

We are falling fast and its not looking like it will be pretty.

All we need is a major global issue to test our national resilience and the incompetence will truly be laid bare for us all to see... But not necessarily speak of. Such us the way it works.

Brexit Britain is not a nice looking prospect.

It won't be the subjects of the UK that will be the brake on these maniacs. It'll be the need to keep the UKs reputation "onside" with the rest of the world.

smallbusinessprices.co.uk/brexit-index

smallbusinessprices.co.uk
Brexit Job Loss Index: 436,296 Jobs Lost As Of 31 January 2020
I signed an NDA! says
4-5 minutes

The Brexit Job Loss Index is an attempt to keep track of the number of jobs lost in the UK due to Brexit.

Here are the key stats (last updated 31/01/2020):

Total Jobs Lost: 436,296
Total Annual Wages Lost*: £12,511,660,392
Reduction in Annual Income Tax & National Insurance Receipts**: £3,747,289,625.52

Job Losses By Region

Scotland: 30,223
Midlands: 26,318
North East: 22,324
London: 22,245
Wales 14,265
South West: 13,959
North West: 9,144
South East: 5,095
East of England: 5,027
Northern Ireland: 2,555
Gibraltar: 1,000
Southern England: 870
No specific region: 283,729

10 Worst Hit Cities & Towns

Glasgow: 24,612
London: 22,245
Wylfa Newydd: 9,350
Scunthorpe: 6077
Swindon: 4,951
Manchester: 4,912
Yorkshire: 4,362
Bridgend: 4,010
Derby: 4,000
Hull: 3287

10 Worst Hit Sectors

Automotive: 66,032
Transport: 39,143
Food & drink: 32,081
Finance: 18,399
Construction: 15,102
Clothing: 12,445
Aerospace: 4,324
Agriculture: 3,100
Hospitality: 2,700
Consumer durables: 2,556
ICT: 2,527

Brexit Job Loss Map

Brexit Job Loss Map
Map from Easy Map Maker Up 19 Feb 2019
Job Loss Data & Methodology

The full data for the above comes this document published by Brexit Job Losses. The list has been compiled by #MrHickmott. Here is his methodology:

Job losses are attributed to Brexit if they meet one or more of the following conditions:

1. The employer’s business has been significantly affected by sterling’s devaluation, either immediately through rises in the cost of imported inputs or later by inflation passed on by those who were so affected.

1. Government austerity cuts are attributed to Brexit since Britain voted to remain the EU, austerity would have been lifted instead of deepened.

1. Barring other obvious explanations businesses that were doing okay but experienced a significant slowdown after the Brexit vote are deemed to have been impacted by Brexit.

1. Businesses and other enterprises (e.g. EU regulatory authorities) that will be impacted by the imposition of trading or regulatory barriers (including the potential imposition of tariffs).

1. All jobs moved abroad are considered Brexit-related even if offshored outside the EU, since Brexit makes Britain a “third country” to the EU, just like India or China.

Other factors are occasionally cited but these are the main categories.

Job losses due to changes in the way business is conducted, such as those due to banking automation or to internet shopping, are usually excluded unless there is some compelling reason to regard Brexit is the real reason for cutting staff.

However, as the Dec 2019 election was about Brexit, the author has decided to include losses due to Tory policy.

You see the full list of employers and losses below.

Other popular small business topics:

Top 27 UK Business Bank Accounts
Top 14 Best Business Credit Cards
Top 23 Unsecured Business Loans
Small Business Electricity Prices
Top 32 WordPress Hosting Providers: Compare 2020 UK Prices
6 Cheap Mobile Credit Card Payment Machines For UK Small Businesses
34 Business Insurance Providers
20 Public Liability Insurance Providers
Top 17 UK Commercial Mortgages
Top 24 Phone Systems For UK Small Business
Invoice Factoring Cost Comparison: Top 23 Companies In The UK

• To calculate lost wages we simply take the numbers of job lost multiplied by the average earnings for full-time employees in the UK, which currently sits at £28,677 annually. Data from the ONS. ** To calculate lost income tax and national insurance receipts we used this tax calculator to calculate the tax and NI (employee and employer) owed for someone earning £28,677 annually (UK average full-time wage). The total works out to £8,588.87 per job, which we multiplied by the number of jobs lost. Reader Interactions

Thanks for that dg
Not great news for my area or nearest town :(

The other dangers of being a thick politician. Of course we have no idea what the security services have on Boris.

The problem is, now we've established the head of state has no powers whatsover, what's the point ?

www.thelondoneconomic.com/politics/mi5-reducing-amount-of-intelligence-they-pass-to-priti-patel-because-they-dont-trust-her/23/02/

thelondoneconomic.com
Mi5 reducing amount of intelligence they pass to Priti Patel
Jack Peat
2-3 minutes

Priti Patel slammed for smirking through list of companies which have raised concerns about a no-deal Brexit

MI5 chiefs are reducing the amount of intelligence they pass to Priti Patel because they do not have “have confidence in her abilities”.

According to reports the Home Secretary is “extremely difficult to deal with” because she does not “grasp the subtleties of intelligence”.

Security service personnel apparently regularly ‘roll their eyes’ following interventions made by Ms Patel during high level meetings.
Bullying claims

The reports come amid bullying claims from staff who say Patel belittles officials, makes unreasonable demands and has created an “atmosphere of fear”.

It has also been claimed that she sought to oust permanent secretary Sir Philip Rutnam from the Home Office.

Matters came to a head last week when a senior official collapsed after a meeting with Ms Patel following an all-night effort to reverse a High Court ruling barring the deportation of 25 foreign criminals to Jamaica.
Extremely difficult to deal with

Speaking to the Sunday Times, one official said: “The spooks find her extremely difficult to deal with.

“She doesn’t grasp the subtleties of intelligence. It’s not black and white. They don’t have confidence in her abilities.”

Another source said the security services “have to decide how much to share, and they share less”.

They also claimed that Ms Patel is now “informed about things later in the decision making process”.

Leclerc is channelling his inner grey haired scarecrow
but comments from France that all the Brexit news is just grim

I do wonder how much the pro Brexit folks are enjoying their newfound freedom.
Do they feel better for knowing that their blue passports might get stuck as customs because they are printed abroad?
Do they realise that the clampdown on immigration will mean they can no longer get care workers and hospital cleaners?
And that is before we come onto the paralysis in the retail market ....

Rishi has quite a job to do to inspire confidence
and only three weeks to pull the wool over people's eyes until there is a new shadow Chancellor .....

She's another Grayling (continuing gross incompetence) but far nastier

Do they realise that the clampdown on immigration will mean they can no longer get care workers and hospital cleaners?

I find it grimly amused that we've gone from "They need us to buy their cars", to "They need us to go on hen and stag nights". Which I would respectfully suggest really overestimates any respect - or otherwise - the English have in mainland Europe.

That only confirms what we knew already. Priti Useless/Thick Patel was promoted way above her abilities, along with the majority (rest?) of the Cabinet.

God help us.

Can confirm the Swede's I spoke to regarding Brexit all think it's a stupid idea and hope we'll not suffer too much on the outside, for the sake of those who didn't want to leave. The respect for the UK as an institution is nil.

I find it interesting that Johnson wants to break the power of the unions at the same time he is clashing with the civil service and trying to radically reshape Britain.

The respect for the UK as an institution is nil.

Obviously with a grand total of fuck all experience in the real world of business, our shiny new "open for business" cabinet haven't the first idea of how people go into business meetings. If they are interested, I can let them know that it's not a great start when your counterparts start by saying "Well, that's all very nice. But can we trust you ?". Where "you" isn't the person, nor the company, but the country that is aspiring to oversee any contract. At some point the legal wheedling is simply going to be too fiddly, and someone will say "Hey, why not ask the Germans [or French, or Italians, or Spanish] if they can do it instead ?"

I know that MI5/MI6 are the ones responsible for 'dirty tricks', but they are probably now the only people who could bring Priti Patel down. We can't rely on the judiciary because she thinks she is above the law and will try to get the law changed anyway.

When was Johnson last sighted?

As a matter of interest....

I think it's really odd Johnson hasn't been seen AT ALL for ages.
Is this just modern life / social media and pms used to frequently disappear for large stretches of time, but we didn't notice because we weren't used to the instant communication?
Why wouldn't he just make some cheap comment for easy points?
Is he ill or something?
Not meaning to be conspiratorial, it's just weird isn't it?

(I mean I also think it's disgusting and pathetic the lack of meaningful response to the floods, but obviously didn't expect anything real from these climate change denying twats, just surprised there's not been some cheap pointscoring)

Yeah, it’s odd.

No speeches. No rallying the troops from a safe distance. No COBRA meetings. Back to leaving (new) ministers to cover the lack of any senior ministerial input (Eustice).

But given Johnson’s woeful attempts last time and his reception, what did we expect? He’s completely and utterly useless.

Fuckwit.

Looking at twitter, the last video of him was the 14th. There were a few tweets after that but no media so could be posted by anyone. The No. 10 twitter account is very quiet too.

Just reading up on drug supply chains in relation to coronavirus. Omg its not pretty.

For all the talk of hauwei and nuclear power I had no idea how exposed we are with drug production in the UK, Europe and the US. 80% of drugs in the US are manufactured there and they were talking about how much of a national security risk this was and needed to be addressed.

The crisis in China is particularly worrying because they are the no1 producer of antibiotic ingredients in the world. The US no longer manufacturers penicillin.

There's real concerns that we could start seeing shortages of 150 drugs in the next few weeks, particularly if things do not improve in Hubei Province.

It doesn't take a genius to work out how much of a concern this could be.

It could well strengthen support for the idea of Brexit but in the short term doesn't change anything on a practical level. And the government would be blamed for NHS shortages.

I sincerely hope we don't end up there, but something massive to keep an eye on in terms of political fall out, regardless of whether we end up with a pandemic in the UK

BJ is lazy and workshy, going by his previous jobs

He lets others - in this job, Cummings, Patel, Raab .... - do his work for him

Social care crisis risks ‘two-tier’ blow to the poor, ministers warned

Losing up to 130,000 EU care workers won't help
No wonder if Priti wants to get the (poor) retired back into work

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/feb/23/social-care-crisis-blow-to-poor

Experts say funding cuts led to care homes closures which only the rich can escape

Martin Green, chief executive of the social care trade body Care England, warned there was a real risk of a two-tier system emerging that would see the poorest suffer the most. “

If you go to some places there are no new care homes being built and the stock available is running to the end of its life, or not fit for purpose,”
he said.
“It’s not just about capacity dwindling – there is nobody coming in those areas to replace them.
It will be an attrition process.

You end up with a social care system for the rich, and really poor experiences for the poor.

“There is a huge amount of external investment ready to go into this sector.
But, of course, it’s all based on high-end, high-quality, self-funding clients.

Funny enough I was also commenting to DH how Johnson just seems to have disappeared. We never hear from or about him. The non existent PM. What have his minders done with him??

I read that Johnson was staying at his holiday residence.

Is he ill or something?

Maybe he is self quarantining himself ?

@RedToothBrush, you make a good point about the drug situation. NHS Brexit preparations (or lack thereof) last year showed just how dependent we are on the just in time chain for medicines.

Fingers firmly crossed, here.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-51609041 - no 10 looking for a HR bod.

I can't see either pfeffel or cummings asking for this, presumably senior civil service pushing back?

According to Huffington Boris is spending his time at Chevening - presumably the "intensity" of no 10 isn't a good match to his slacker mentality, whilst relaxing in the country seat whilst the country burns is much more his style - and more room for Carrie.

Priti Patel does not like the claims that MI5 is withholding information.

I do wonder what exactly the truth is here?