Conservatives closing the gap on reform

[Pinkponyclub3]

Any conservative supporters here ?
Recent reports say the gap on reform is closing
Having watched some clips of kemi in action,I was quite impressed
But I don't know much about the party having never voted conservative,
Have they more of an insight in to current feeling than labour?

Completely agree. He’s a disruptor who wouldn’t know where to start.

Hmm, the expression, "The pot calling the kettle black” comes to mind, eg, it’s ok for you to say what you want, which of course it is, however if anyone has a different opinion to yours 😱you don’t like it, you then turn it around, you’re right the other person must be wrong Hypocrisy at its finest!! @IMissTheLittleBluePackets

Yes, completely agree, unfortunately though, there would be another one to take his place.It’s just a recipe for disaster!

Farage is a one off. He is Reform, it would fizzle out without him.

@BIossomtoes yes, l really hope so.

@Justchilling07 you could run her last sentence through any sentiment analysis software you could find, and it would be deemed snotty at best.

As soon as people adopt that superior attitude when talking politics, it just winds me up and admittedly, I lose all respect for them. I don't know why we can't be respectful on these threads. Nobody has all the answers.

@IMissTheLittleBluePackets yes, l think l’ve got a bit carried away myself.I do get what you’re saying, l agree, l know l definitely haven’t got all the answers, sometimes l get a bit carried away on threads.But yes thank you, for your calm and thoughtful response, apologies for my last one.

Thanks @Justchilling07 I really appreciate that and return the sentiment. Merry Christmas 🎄

Thank you, appreciated@IMissTheLittleBluePackets merry Christmas to you also 🎄

The problem I have with the conservative party is they will just increase the already growing gap between the poorest and the wealthy.

We have had decades of conservative rule since the 1970s. The Labour party have had very little time in power and yet they are blamed for all of today's problems.

It was Boris Johnson that allowed immigration from other countries as the doors closed on the European Union.

It was Thatcher that sold off the water , electric and gas , telecommunication companies. She sold off council housing and led to creation of new social landlords....which really are just private landlords.

Here is the situation, you have growing inequality and a huge gap in skills. This requires huge amounts of investment in training and education and there's only one way to achieve this and that involves using tax payers money to focus on further education and training. It's the only way to get people into well paid work and off welfare.

Same as healthcare, the NHS needs a trillion pounds to resolve the problems long term...... failure to invest now will only mean paying later on. Poor health outcomes costs billions in welfare later on.

When people start saying healthcare is unaffordable for the masses then please take a look at Africa or South America.....then say you want that here. Even in America healthcare is becoming a luxury.....

Yes 100% but for some reason, many think we need more of their failed experiments.

I think nothing shows the Tories for what they are than their pre election unfunded NI cut, not done as an election bribe but to fuck up the incoming Labour Govt... but of course who did it really screw up? not Labour but us, the UK - they simply don't care.

Power is all that matters, they and their supporters have a 4/5 year plan to get back in and they will do anything to make it work.

Unfortunately I think social media is shaping minds, hardly anyone reads these days. The amount of people who say they want Trump but if you know many Americans....they want rid of him. It's no surprise that Trump is building his own loyal military to do his bidding. All the old generals are being replaced by people willing to break international law. Look at history and you will find that it's a card played by all dictators. So we will see what happens when American democracy tries to remove him.

British people need to wake up and start reading about history. Learn about the lives of working class people during the industrial revolution and how much we have achieved. The likes of Reform would roll back the clock on many things we actually take for granted but a 100 years ago we never had.

Universal healthcare paid through taxation should never be given up. Nor should we accept that breaking international law is ok as long as it achieves an objective.

If we honestly value christianity then we should live by it's values. You can't pick and choose which values you want to keep. I'm afraid our friend Trump is no Christian despite his talk, money is his religion.

I think the British people should actually think about all the things they should be proud of and why we shouldn't be talking of scrapping things like free education and health-care.

I think the British people should actually think about all the things they should be proud of

We certainly should.

The things that spring to my mind are:

• scientific enquiry and discovery: Newton, Darwin, Fleming, the foundations of computer science with Turing, Babbage and Lovelace, creation of vaccination (Edward Jenner), discovery of DNA
• the practicality and get-up-and-go which UK innovators used to turn all those incredible scientific discoveries and inventions into genuine innovative progress (the industrial revolution, telecommunications, the World Wide Web, cloning, IVF)
• the vision to change the world including the rule of law and parliamentary democracy which was encoded in the the Magna Carta, leading the way in abolishing the slave trade, writing the foundations of modern human rights agreements like EHCR, and even the many long-lasting benefits Britain brought to it's colonies - unpopular though that view is now - eg infrastructure, access to markets, legal systems, human rights (yes, really), governance and administrative functions
• Our Arts have influenced the world: Literature (Shakespeare, Chaucer, Dickins, Jane Austin, George Orwell, Tolkien, JK Rowling; Music (the Beetles, Rolling Stones, Queen,Brit pop); Art (Turner, Hockney)
• Many of the world's most popular sports were invented or codified in the UK (Football, Rugby, Cricket, Tennis, Golf, Badminton, Darts, Boxing, Croquet, Snooker, Billiards, Field Hockey)

So much world-enhancing history - from such a tiny country - and so much to be proud of! Isn't it strange that since the 60s, there's been a concerted effort in schools to make kids ashamed of being British, and dissociated from our absolutely incredible, illustrious past!

Our Welfare state and NHS? Yes, sure - that's one in a long line of imaginative, creative innovations the British have brought about. It was an improvement at the time, but has changed beyond all recognition, and developed some seriously negative side effects. It's certainly ripe for being re-imagined and re-worked - and luckily as you can see from that list (far from comprehensive), innovation and transformation are very long-standing UK strengths.

Funny that your view of the NHS is not shared by other countries all over the world. In Saudi where I have worked, they have free healthcare funded by the countries rich mineral wealth. France have a system funded by taxation, Australia largely taxation and compulsory deductions, most of Europe funded by taxation.

The NHS is by far the most efficient system that allows research, cheap purchasing of drugs because of its buying power.....but is largely massively underfunded....per capita we spend very little on healthcare. Dentists are now largely private now and look at the mess.....it's taken a Labour government to address funding.

America....funded by private insurance and is now bankrupt with over 1/3 of Americans with absolutely no cover.

We are a health service with a country attached. We spend far too much of our GDP on it and we can't afford it as it is. We need to start thinking about the future and our children not piling on debt for our own benefit for them to pay off down the line. We aren't the ones paying for ourselves. Its just going on the credit card.

This post nails it really. With one caveat : healthcare is already a luxury in the USA. I have a study buddy who is a nursing care manager in a major US hospital. When she retires she will have to find nearly $20k from her retirement lump sum to pay for an operation she had decades ago. She had thought it was covered by her employers scheme but no , alas. And if she can get caught out ....It's a disaster and every American Ive met seems to have their own horror story.
In short - save the NHS

If we had to chose between the NHS and defence which would you chose?

Health comes first because you can't defend a country when you have people who are too sick to fight..... please read some history on the first world and second world war.......

But that's not true, we can afford it. We can't afford not to fund it....

But what if you have this wrong?

When we are more equal, is it because no one is getting rich? Just staying poor together doesn’t seem preferable to me.

If some people get rich without lowering anyone else’s position in absolute terms, this seems a good outcome to me. A good outcome on the basis that these rich people will make an oversized contribution to the tax base which helps us all. They also accumulate the funds needed to sustain innovation and entrepreneurship.

I don’t want an equal society. I want a society with lots of opportunities and a safety net.

Wrong answer.

"please read some history on the first world and second world war" 🤣. Bit patronising there. Do you think the Germans waited for the countries they invaded to build up their defences first? Do you think if we get attacked by the Russians or the Chinese they will wait until we have built up our defences? Just so we can spend our time now spaffing money into the bottomless pit of the NHS?

Defence is the main role of government.

Of course we can't afford it. We are just spending money the country doesnt have on nice things like free health care and putting the burden on future generations who won't have that benefit but will still have to pay off ours. Same as pensions. Future generations won't have a state pension (unless you work for the state) but will have to pay off the borrowing costs of money spent on pensions today.

Have a look at the figures.

We really can't afford it. We're already paying more on national debt interest than on education. If we borrow more to spunk on the NHS, it just means bigger interest payments. We're already nearly 3 TRILLION in debt. We're borrowing constantly just to pay for current public services and basically borrowing to pay interest on the borrowing. It's not sustainable. We're just constantly borrowing from our children's futures and they're going to end up with worse public services, lower benefits (i.e. almost certainly no state pension for all), higher taxes, etc.

If you want to spend more on the NHS, it means spending less on other things. NHS is the biggest spend, so it would mean huge cuts to other public spending to make any meaninful increase in the NHS budget. And then the NHS is a leaky bucket and most of the increase would be lost to waste and inefficiency.

And we could reduce NHS spending by a good 30% plus if more people took responsibility for their own health: cut back on drinking and smoking, stop taking drugs, eat more healthily, move for 30 minutes a day….At a population level this would make a huge difference and free up resources for illnesses which are not lifestyle driven.

And we also need to revise our attitudes towards end of life health care. Too many demented old people,with no quality of life, being warehoused in grim conditions and kept alive at huge expense - often against the wishes they expressed before they developed dementia.

Evidence of that 30% figure? The cost to the NHS of smoking related illnesses is less than half the revenue from tobacco tax - are you sure you want the few remaining smokers (of which I’m not one) to give up?