Andy B’s speech

[TheRealSmurfette]

What did you like / not like?

I think it was more aimed at the party your dog votes for.

I liked his speech. Local authorities are spending a fortune on social care with private companies. Taking them out of the picture will save money.

Reform would benefit massively from PR? There's a reason the main two parties have been anti for decades.

The speech made by Keir Starmer was proclaimed as being very good too just a year ago and look what happened to him.
I do worry that Andy Burnham is making a lot about dementia care because his father died from it but there are other terrible illnesses that need funding such as research into brain tumours.

I don't like pr. I like having an MP my area voted for.

Dementia care though is very neglected. He is trying to bring it into line with cancer care which tends to be better.

It would gain more seats, but it would struggle to get into power as no other significant parties would want to enter a coalition with them, unless Badenoch changed her mind.

He did indeed.

Labour is still in power though and gaining in the polls. How people felt about Starmer's speech is irrelevant at this point. He's gone.

Dementia is the biggest cause of death in the UK now. It kills more people than cancer.

Because they got that wrong, it’s the same verdict on these threads.

And is the one illness that causes people to pay a lot of money out for care. The proposal is for people having carers visiting at home, so will help those who can still live at home.

Water companies do need sorting out - they have a monopoly and there is zero competition unlike in other utilities. It is the lack of competition and the fact that water is going to be an increasingly scarce resource. So I don’t think he needs to be selling this as some sort of massive leftie renationalisation thing, it makes sense anyway. Same with social care, it saves the NHS and saves money in the long run, if properly staffed and planned.
The thing I did not like though is the whole chat around the Manchester run way vs Heathrow. We might need both. We need lots of infrastructure projects. However, unless we learn from other countries on how they do these far better, far cheaper and far quicker - that is the real thing we need to get to the bottom of first.

The debt for water companies is very high. It could be transferred to tax payers but it will cost.

On Brexit if he runs on it and it’s a no thanks, at least it’s settled for a while.

I agree with all of that except the runways point. Water really must be sorted out. Thames Water should just be declared bankrupt and taken back with no compensation. The shareholders have had their fill of our money.

It felt such a relief to hear a PM with a vision.

Mostly in violent agreement with everything (and I personally benefit from the triple lock and have saved to pay for my own care).

Some reality checks

• funding. Where is money going to come from to pay for things? watering down the triple lock is not going to pay for a national care service, or buying the water companies back. Where is growth going to come from?
• what's the actual promise on care? I hope the focus will start with proper funding for current services rather than trying to fund free care for everyone so their children can inherit

That’s interesting - I wasn’t on mumsnet when Starmer did his first party conference speech, so, I don’t know what the reception on here was like, but I don’t remember the media in general being as glowing about it as they are about Burnham’s, were they? Speaking personally, I definitely don’t think Starmer ever gave a speech in anything near the same league as yesterday’s, and I don’t think we’ve had a leading politician with as much rhetorical skill since maybe David Cameron.

I do know what you mean about the stuff on dementia care feeling very raw and personal, but I think social care has been a mission of Andy Burnham’s for a long time, I certainly remember him talking about it a lot as health secretary.

Nobody ever described a Starmer speech as the best political speech of their lifetime. Several commentators said that about Burnham’s yesterday. Even Andrew Marr who isn’t easily impressed.

Billionaires have a lot to do with it @Pineneedlesincarpet. They own our utility companies now. Most of them are foreign so they’ve never lived here or paid tax on the profits they extort from us
A lot of water/electricity shares are owned by foreign government pension schemes ( for example the Toronto government I think has or used to own a lot and I think the French) They weren't stupid enough to privatise their own utilities and they have made a lot of money for their own public servants out of successive UK government short termism, incompetence, laziness and greed. It's not the 'billionnaires' who have caused the problem. It's that they have been completely unregulated for decades. They ran a monopoly and basically shovelled money into directors and shareholders pockets for decades while OFWAT ( a government regulator) sat around doing nothing.

I think it will also pay for personal care in care homes, but the accommodation element will still need to be paid for. Similar to Scotland.

Some people said they liked having a prime minister that was an adult rather than wittering on about Peppa pig like Boris johnson. So his speech was praised, but it was in comparison to a very low bar. Nobody said it was the best speech ever.

Glad to hear it. Paying for accommodation and food is reasonable

Yes. It would be nice if it was run on a not for profit basis. But that might be asking too much.

I completely agree with it being a low bar - in fact, the main reason I personally liked it is - having found myself feeling completely disillusioned with politics for many years - it was the first speech I’ve heard in a long time by any politician, from any party, that made me really sit up and listen.

(I don’t think I’ve said it was the best speech ever, by the way - more that I was very pleasantly surprised and impressed by it, and also that I’ve seen it highly praised in the media including from some fairly unexpected quarters)

Nothing on immigration or defence ?? !!!

It is not really about the speech for me. He is simply clearly far smarter than the rest (especially Farage, and also smarter than Badenoch) - so for that alone, I would trust him more. If he needs to make certain speeches to make Milliband cry to get some of Labour onside so be it. I am simply interested in someone competent who can sort the mess out and it really is an almighty mess at this point.