Question Time Leaders Special

[TheShellBeach]

On now BBC1

Link to the interview here, it’s about 45 mins so they really get into the nitty gritty: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-rest-is-money/id1703785141?i=1000657223674

Honestly public spending is near 100 percent of GDP. I think posters here are intelligent enough to know what means. If we cannot grow our economy it means eventually there must be cuts assuming Labour are sincere on their manifesto. How long do we give them? I can see it will take years, maybe a decade to get back to where the country was in 2008.

We have stagnated for 14 years. I don’t think a decade is unlikely. I suppose I would like to see this national plan for growth very soon after (if) Labour come in

Why? Victoria Starmer does work in the NHS. KS sister also works in the social care sector

I’m not sure he’s hiding his real ability under a bushel but this is trusting and rating him, which is your choice but I’d need more than a toolmaker sell to see it

Do you have a sense of what he’ll do to get what you’re after?

Exactly this. I want normal boring politics back. That thing we had before that idiot called a referendum

It's only 8 years ago - it feels like forever away.

I don't want to be entertained by politics. If I want entertainment I will go to the theatre

@StriStripedPiggy Johnson was a threat to U.K security.

Johnson elevated Evgeny Lebedev to the house of Lords (Lebedev, son of former KGB agent Alexander Lebedev, a contemporary of Vladimir Putin) in a move that was widely condemned.

MI5 visited Downing Street about this. He ignored it.

It is also known that Johnson had a private meeting when he was a foreign secretary with Russian counterparts.

It's a polarising argument point over JC. Many will be for and against

It's clear for anyone, even if in hindsight Johnson was a threat.

www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/06/30/the-dubious-relationship-between-boris-johnson-and-the-lord-of-siberia_6040133_4.html

Probably there is a fair bit more on Johnson to come out. I wouldn’t be looking to his forthcoming book to elucidate this stuff however

DH and I both worked in the NHS for over 30 years each. We are tired of politicians trotting out this kind of statement. We are jaded and cynical I suppose. I have worked through 4 re-organisations and each has been worse than the last. Maybe Labour will make some useful changes. Maybe Keir's family connection will encourage to them consult with the people working in the NHS. We shall see.

Fair enough - I understand your point. I think he will make a difference.

My concern is that people will think it will happen overnight. It won't, and it can't.

Anything decent is built on solid foundations and takes time. It will take 2 terms to see long-term sustainable improvement.

KS has a whole country in every sector to fix. I think he is the right man for the job. As you say, time will tell.

This isn't 1997. When TB came to power, the economy was much improved. However, with the "slease" (which pales to insignificance with the past 14 years), it overrided all else.

I don't envy KS his task. He certainly likes a challenge

No, indeed.

It'll be a self-congratulatory obfuscation of the truth, with several chapters about how the good old NHS saved his life when he got Covid.

You know - the same NHS he laboriously and studiously dismantled.

Hmm what am I after? I'm after sensible, boring, capable grown ups being in charge of the country. Starmer meets those criteria quite easily. What a relief after Johnson and Truss.

How much off the cuff decision and talking points does a PM even do? Why not get a good pool of questions and give them to the parties in advance and get some serious deliberated feedback? There doesn't seem to be anything like this. There isn't much potential group think cabinet exposure. But perhaps that's just impossible, as the civil service would need consultation etc.

There's no big ideas. No talk about transport as mentioned on R4 this morning. No talk about the financial collapse and how to rescue a broken capitalistic society. It's just all plasters and sticky tape. With the odd xenophobic rant. With people still believing Johnny Foreigner is to blame for British problems, with classic scapegoating. Yeah we all know Britain is broken, but how do we fix her? And the myopic self-centred-ness of make Britain great again at the expense of any foreign interest or help is equally galling. I know it's part of the State's job to take care of its own but it's very little Britain. Why shouldn't the UK take a fair share of illegals along with the rest of Europe.

My Mum moans about those brown foreigners coming in on boats but seems to be totes fine with the idea of displaced Ukrainians. However she pisses and moans about the Polish in town and probably voted for Brexit to stop the influx of non-Europeans. She'd faint if I told her the reality of what has happened since.

He is on next week with the Green Party

So not really about the things he will put in place that will work? Wondering what they will be in reality

I kept seeing wait until manifestos and these debates but the lack of answers at this stage seems problematic

So Farage and the Greens will be on together.

Keeping the lunatic fringes together, I see.

Apparently the line up for the debates was sorted before Farage announced he was going to stand, so they’re having to shoe horn him in for the sake of “balance” (big finger quotes from me there).

Personally I’d rather they locked him in a broom closet for the next 2 weeks, but hey we can dream!

Hopefully he'll make a complete idiot of himself.
I don't understand why anyone would vote for him.

Well, I do understand, but it's awful to be giving airtime to such a racist POS.

Baffled by how unprepared they all were. Some of the questions designed to trip them up could be seen from a mile away.

But as ever these debates change very little because they aren’t designed to, and like most people I made my mind up before the election was even announced. Looking forward to PM Keir, because of, not in spite of, the fact he’s boring. The, ahem, excitement of the past years has been so damaging to the country in so many ways, I cannot fathom how anyone is voting conservative.

Also enjoying that tactical voting is really seeming to be a thing now: for decades the tories have used FPTP in their favour, and it’s now going to bite them in the arse. Goodbye, blue rosettes, hope you enjoy the wilderness.

Listening to the latest Political Currency podcast this morning, George Osborne said last night’s debate format was the one they all dread the most. Nowhere to hide and no way of knowing what sort of reception you’ll get from the audience.

Exactly he was not a good Chancellor as many people claimed - yet got shunted in as PM. CFO/ Chancellors usually have a numbers skill-set which is all about the detail. Leaders such as CEOs/ PMs need to be able to see the big picture too, have political judgment and people skills.

I am constantly bored of Sunak's arrogant tecthiness - the man is so thin skinned, which I find typical of banker/ hedge fund types. I hope he loses his seat and slinks off to California as predicted.

@bombastix I agree that Reform have diagnosed and described the problems; like you, nothing would induce me to vote for them, their figures are risible. The public finances are shocking and my guess is that no one will like the solutions. Austerity on steroids.

ThisOldThang, Starmer’s father didn’t own a factory. He worked for a firm and then for himself from a workshop. A one man band. Hardly a factory!

hope he loses his seat and slinks off to California as predicted.

I'm torn. He seems to so clearly want to jump ship to enjoy Californian Dreamin' that I'm tempted to hope he wins his seat (because he probably doesn't want to win...). Although I guess then he'll probably just stand down citing family reasons after a short time, so will get what he wants anyway.

Off topic, sorry, but I love donkeys so wondering. Does anyone know what happened to the donkeys in the donkey sanctuary that Starmer (or was it his dad) sold? I hope they had decent rehoming.

Does anyone know where her lovely linen suit is from ?