UK General Discussion: Rishecession

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Sunak has gone to Parliament, presumably to sack various ministers.

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The first cabinet exit is the most predictable one - JRM.

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Brandon Lewis (Justice Secretary) also resigns.

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That's about half the cabinet out. I suspect the replacements will be mostly familiar faces rather than new blood, for risk aversion.

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https://twitter.com/10DowningStreet/status/1584931875965251585

LMAO

Every child's dream is to grow up to be Minister Without Portfolio.

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This is going well.

https://twitter.com/MrHarryCole/status/1584944160091799552?s=20&t=A3-a2pedDC...

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Labour will be hoping that Williamson gets regularly wheeled out to the airwaves. Possibly the worst media performer to have ever held a cabinet position.

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Labour will be hoping that Williamson gets regularly wheeled out to the airwaves. Possibly the worst media performer to have ever held a cabinet position.

Keith Joseph erasure.

Ah yeah, the failed magician.

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Walpole (first (recognised) Prime Minister and longest serving Prime Minister)
Perceval (only Prime Minister to be assassinated)
Truss (shortest serving Prime Minister)

All pub quiz answers for at least a couple of centuries, I would imagine.

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https://twitter.com/POLITlCSUK/status/1587051559011160064?s=20&t=gJ_cbmop_kF...

LMFAO.

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He does seem to be singularly determined to establish a second income. Podcasts, NFTs, begging Johnson and Truss for a government job, running for various committee chairs, the attempt to flog his new memoir.

Edit: he’s been suspended from the parliamentary party, and had the whip withdrawn. Based on the comments made by his local party, this really might be curtains for his Commons career.

This is unfair on him really, but he's almost reminding me of Neil Hamilton.

There are a lot of Tory figures from the 1990s who have since tried, with varying success, to establish media careers since leaving politics. Michael Portillo is the most successful example. Ed Balls is the equivalent figure from New Labour.

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Gavin Williamson almost certainly has the Caro LBJ collection in the drawers next to his bed. That's about the only sentence in which it's appropriate to mention both him and LBJ.

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Tice is probably a better media performer than Farage. The problem for him is that he can't get any media coverage.

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HRH the Prince of Wales presented the England team with the squad numbers for the World Cup yesterday and made the comments along the lines of how the whole country was rooting for them. Unless he's doing the same thing with the Wales team (who are not only also in the World Cup but in England's group) this seems a bit odd.

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Mhari Black or Tommy Shepherd would be fun.

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The by-election in 2009 produced an interesting result due to it being held around the time of the expenses scandal. Both UKIP and the Greens polled well and Craig Murray received almost 1,000 votes standing on a 'Put An Honest Man Into Parliament' ticket, ahead of the BNP (which was more or less at its height). Labour got around 18% of the vote - diabolically low for a seat like that.

Following politics at that time, particularly online, was quite depressing (not that it ever isn't). The subject of the BNP (who had an army of trolls across the political internet) was so often at the forefront and the Tory critique of Labour's economic record was portrayed as fact by pretty much the entire media, including those parts supposed to be impartial......

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https://twitter.com/electpoliticsuk/status/1598254552322408453?s=20&t=bKctOE...
Reform now getting near UKIP 2015 levels. Boris will be hoping that this continues and that it also shows up in by-elections and local elections. That was how (or the main reason anyway) he got the premiership in 2019.

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Sajid Javid has announced his departure at the next election. Someone who could have been Prime Minister at some point in the past few years if certain events had played out differently.

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East Anglia has something of a 1945 look on that map.

Probably underestimates the Lib Dems too.

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Perhaps, but as we saw in Quebec, voters will eventually get tired of the debate about independence, and move on to bread-and-butter issues.

The constitutional question has remained at the forefront (as has the SNP in electoral and government terms) through Covid, Brexit, austerity, various other crises and a series of scandals. It could be that independence is a bread-and-butter issue in the minds of a lot of voters, rightly or wrongly  The 'getting tired of it' part may well only occur after the issue has been settled.

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In the context of reform having a small bump in coverage I’ve seen a lot of Conservative MPs claim the issue of small boats is the ‘no.1’ issue on the doorstep especially in the future marginals in the Midlands, South coast and so forth.

The polling doesn’t reflect this and I assume it’s the usual tyranny of the doorstep- I obviously don’t spend my time talking to Tories on the doorstep so I remain sceptical of how much anger there actually is on this issue?

I am aware politicians frequently lie or distort what they hear- so I guess Occams Razor applies?

Of course the "tyranny of the doorstep" is very much a cross-party thing - it certainly helps explain why many Labour MPs are so reactionary on drugs reform, for example.

The Tyranny of Twitter may be a newer form of this.

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There’s a danger this descends into farce by the Government- the advice not to get drunk or go out on the ice unless you slip is pretty hilarious.

Given that there was a serious debate a couple of years ago about whether scotch eggs are a substantial meal and a chief constable was threatening to search shopping bags for non essential items, it's not exactly surprising.

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George Galloway had similar nicknames.

Anyway, the Honours List has dropped:

BBC News report

Brian May is more worthy than Theresa May.

Leah Williamson is more worthy than Gavin Williamson.

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Truly bizarre. Maths until the age of 18 isn't something on the minds of most of the population at present and it's surely not even a hot-button issue for the base. If he had made some pledge regarding the boats with the latter in mind then it would be more understandable in a political sense.

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https://twitter.com/alicia_fitzg/status/1610652667092807687?s=20&t=NvmFeZi1P...