Times article suggesting Rayner is a shoo-in for PM within months - please god no

[teawamutu]

Hopefully this link will work:
https://www.thetimes.com/article/27184a3f-e513-49a6-871d-bc8c71fa7804?shareToken=1740daa659156e3945fd8e025dbf6d22

She signed every anti-women motion. She said she'd save a bench in the Commons for Liam/’Lily' fucking Madigan. She's pointlessly fighty and I'd bet perfectly happy to try to change the Equality Act. At the very least she'd allow FWS to be undermined.

Talk me down and explain why this either won't happen or won't be a disaster, wise FWRers, please!

Plus Starmer isn’t a job creation genius. Felt like Streeting was toadying up to Mandy by bitching about Starmer. Not a good or loyal look for a key cabinet minister. And he’s perfectly capable of making his own growth suggestions (that v few western govts are able to crack).

I am finding Streeting a tiny bit creepy now.

Is he at the same time trying to say of course he supports Starmer while actually still campaigning to take over from him.

And what does it say about him that he seems to have been a Mandelson crony at one time.

I never ever understond how any part of the Labour party from Tory lite Blair to (not in fact that) hard Corbyn ever welcomed him into the Labour Party.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/feb/10/streeting-still-ready-to-challenge-starmer-despite-show-of-unity-allies-say

The Labour party has a death wish. It's become divorced from the people it was set up to represent and its activists live in a fantasy world. So it's not surprising that they've gone along with trans fantasies. Raynham would be a disaster as the financial markets wont love her, they dropped with the suggestion Starmer was in trouble. The best Labour leader for the country currently is Starmer, precisely because he's willing to piss off his party and the rest dont have the guts. Burnham might be a better choice at, or near, the next election but not yet.

Starmer isn’t the person willing to piss off the party McSweeney was.

Starmer might be willing to piss off his party, but the evidence of the past 18-20 months is that he can't command a majority on the difficult stuff and ends up being forced to back down: winter fuel allowance, benefit reform, two-child cap (ironic that he now lauds this as one of his greatest achievements) and most recently disclosure of Mandelson's communications.

He's a lame duck, propped up by a Cabinet who were either worried they might lose their red box and ministerial car under a different pm or fancy themselves as back seat drivers.

It's plain for the electorate to see that even his own party doesn't think he's doing a satisfactory job. We're now forced to wait for the Lab party to get its shit together and decide on a replacement. The delay and dithering just looks self-indulgent. Nothing about the likely candidates is going to change between now and the end of the year (regardless of what HMRC say Rayner will still be someone who was some combination of careles, reckless or negligent with her tax affairs).

The problem with the Labour Party is that they won’t make the hard decisions. They can’t tax their way out of this hole however hard they try

When Starmer said in his speech "I've won every fight I've been in", that says something about his ego, but it's also a blatant lie. He's lost every fight he's been in with the PLP.

No10 spads stiff arming every member of the cabinet into tweeting their confidence in the PM, in response to Anas Sarwar calling for him to go, tells you two things:

1. None of them actually have confidence in the PM; they'd all been silent for at least 24 hours before getting their instructions.
2. None of them think a credible alternative is immediately to hand. Even Wes Streeting, who makes no secret of wanting the top job, doesn't think the timing is right for him.

So you've got a zombie government with no vision of what it's supposed to do, with a PM nobody supports, which can't command a majority in the House to pass anything, just staggering on from day to day trying to survive, relying on the self-interest of MPs who can read the polls and see that they're doomed and don't want to vote themselves out of a job.

They can last a good while like this. Theresa May lasted two whole years in a similar situation. Even Boris lasted for nine months with everyone knowing he was finished but nobody quite knowing what event would pop up to put an end to him. And Labour don't have the Tory tradition of assassinating dud leaders.

Say something about his stereotypically male concept of leadership that he thinks winning fights is the key to good leadership.

Starmer at PMQs just now saying Lord Doyle hadn't given a full and frank account of his friendship with a nonce before his peerage was confirmed, even though it had been on the front page of the Sunday Times in December.

It was a pretty dodgy crony appointment in the first place, but you have to wonder if No10's paedo detector is on the blink.

And, oh yes, that Matthew Doyle: FLASHBACK: Matthew Doyle Denies Briefing Against Rosie Duffield – Guido Fawkes

His male arrogance shines through with that self delusion. Idk how people can bear him.

He could have said "I'm a fighter not a quitter", in the immortal words of Peter Mandelson. Later quoted in PMQs by Liz Truss, just before she resigned.

This. Absolute balls up. Less than two years and dead in the water.

I read a comment on another website that said Two Tier had basically told them if they try to get rid of him he'll call a snap election and then they'll all end up unemployed.

Now I'm not saying it's true, I just found it hilarious. 😂 That's how we do politics now, through fear and intimidation.

Well he's got it right. For once.

First sensible thing he's said yet. Bring on a snap election ffs.

I thought that the hypocrites who turned out to publicly cheer Starmer on are thinking that getting rid of him now is not worth the effort.

They are assuming that the local Elections results will be really bad for Labour, so best to let him stay in post so that he can be blamed.

Then vote him out so that whoever is the new PM isn't tainted by the local elections results.

Not relevant to the thread, but to FWR in general - listening to the spectator podcast with gove and madeline grant, they pointed out that none of the front runners support the assisted dying bill, so that might be on its way out.

Starmer has at least been trying to get the difficult stuff through. Yes he has to fight his party - but none of the others are willing to try. Rayner would upset the markets to the point where she might outlast Liz Truss but not for long. Ed Milliband didnt inspire anyone when he was Leader of the opposition.

I’m finding that podcast very informative lately. Gove and Grant make a good podcasting team - a political sketch writer and an ex govt minister. I’m also enjoying Camilla & Tim on The Daily T.

Alastair & Rory, and Emily/Jon/Lewis, put me off political podcasts for ages but now I’m enjoying the 2 mentioned above as well as the Spiked podcast.

It really helps having the sketch writers on there. Tim Stanley is even more hilarious in person, and we're blessed that he chose the higher calling of sketch writer rather than being an academic historian.

I don't generally go for the centrist dad podcasts, but I sometimes dip into Balls & Osborne, just because I vibe better with it - it doesn't feel preachy, it's more like a couple of old friends who have seen a few things together.

I like the extended interview type podcasts where it's about an hour of conversation with a particular person, with the space to cover issues in depth and breadth. Some interviewers are good at that and some aren't. But I also think of the interviewees - I think Helen Joyce does two or three of those interviews a week, and it might be an established podcast or it might just be a young woman with a small YouTube channel, but you can see how Helen isn't just a naturally good communicator, she uses the conversation to hone her arguments and think through angles that she hasn't really considered before.

I've learned a lot from the Daily T and Spiked, I don't always agree with their point of view but I consider them both to be a trustworthy source of news, which is more than I can say for the BBC and other MSM outlets. 👍

I do enjoy Tim’s dry sense of humour and his persistence in doing imitations of public figures 😂

I tried Balls & Osborne but I’ve always found the high smugness factor of those two men off-putting 😁

I keep a youtube tab open in my browser with a search for Helen Joyce (filtered by date) so I can try and keep on top of her interview output 😬 I’m a bit of a fangirl 😊

I’m enjoying the weekly Sex Matters podcast because it’s knowledgeable women discussing politics, law and society.

I feel a lack of people willing to do imitations of political figures. I know they keep trying to bring Spitting Image back but with little understanding of why it was good 40 years ago.

How is it that David Lammy is one of the most prominent members of the cabinet and nobody in comedy wants to take advantage?

Shabana Mahmood might be good value, but as she says 'fuck' more often than Glinner, maybe she's not the best material for Dead Ringers.

@SionnachRuadh Matt Forde does excellent political impersonations that he works into his standup routines & often his podcast intros, but the material's the problem. Aside from all the work of recovering from a particularly brutal cancer, he has his Focus Group & Political Party (last Monday's ep was an interview with Baronness Cass, haven't listened yet, can't offer a review). Even had he the inclination, I don't know how he'd find time to write an entire impersonation-based show & his talents have been too often wasted by other writers.

I enjoy quite a bit of new Sitting Image (their Starmer cracks me up 😁) but they have just as bad a case of Trump derangement syndrome now as they used to have Thatcher derangement in the 80s. And they don’t step outside middle-class orthodoxy/shibboleths in their sketches so they’re hobbling themselves satire-wise 🤔

I am enjoying their sketches about their feud with “Studio C Anal” over the character of Pads the Peruvian cocaine-smuggling immigrant bear 😈