UK General Discussion: Rishecession

[Cassius]

Truss reportedly having difficulty filling the non-Great Office of State cabinet and ministerial posts.

[Cassius]

All the reports say Truss and Coffey are great friends - which is why her allegedly being sent to  Health is so odd. It’s such an exhausting job, with no easy wins, and an easy way to become one of the least popular members of government.

I guess Coffey has avoided controversy at W&P, (which is no easy feat) so she might just be seen as a safe pair of hands. But having a Deputy PM, who’s in charge of shepherding the NHS through a very tough winter just feels like the government is setting itself up for Labour attack lines - especially if she has to stand in at PMQs at any point in the next six months. 

I suppose it's to emphasise that health will be a priority for the government. Given that Health, arguably, should really be considered a Great Office of State in its own right these days, handing the post to a close confidante of the PM seems like a better move than giving it to some non-entity or as a poisoned chalice to a rival.

Also, we can already see how low Truss' authority within the party is by the way in which certain over-mighty subjects appear to be refusing to serve outright or refusing the cabinet posts offered them by the PM.

[Cassius]

Chancellor Kwartang it is then.

Has been very close to Truss in the past. They know each other well and have often discussed matters affecting the country and, also, I believe Uganda.

Nice that such good friends can live next door to each other.

[Cassius]

I mean he’s not wrong.

[Cassius]

It’s probably not the moment to get into the weeds on this - but I can’t imagine the House of Lords is going to be enthusiastic about Trussenomics, when it comes time to vote on this (whether that’s this package, or a full budget at a later date).

They’re not bound by the Salisbury Convention (where the Lords let most of a party’s manifesto promises pass into law without much argument), as this is basically a 180 from the  Johnson approach, and outside his 2019 platform.

They’re not exactly going to be able to block it - but I wonder whether they might become the thorn in the PM’s side, and slow-walk it.

I think the Lords can’t vote on budget resolutions thanks to some quirk from the Lloyd George era

The Lords aren’t able to prevent money-related bills passing for more than one month.

[Cassius]

I believe we’re watching the political equivalent of Ney’s cavalry charges at Waterloo right now.

[Cassius]

https://mobile.twitter.com/BritainElects/status/1575522731101245440
https://mobile.twitter.com/Survation/status/1575522804644007941

[Cassius]

BORIS WE LOVE YOU ALL IS FORGIVEN

[Cassius]

So, if Truss is the Kim Campbell in this hilarious scenario, who would the Jean Charest and Elsie Wayne be?

Sunak and Ben Houchen running for and winning a Tees seat off the back of local kudos.

[Cassius]

Curious- why do people think that the poll collapse has been so large?

Bernard castle, the 2008 financial crash and other such events didn’t cause such a huge and sudden shift- is it the 45p/bankers bonus angle? The impact on pensions/mortgage rates?

As regards Barnard Castle, I seem to remember that there was a steep drop in the government's poll numbers, but only from the absurdly inflated figures of the initial part of the pandemic. More to the point, I think that most of the public anger about that focused upon Dominic Cummings himself, as opposed to Johnson and the government, and of course that was the point at which the latter began to distance themselves from Cummings so serious damage was avoided (as opposed to a year later with Haremcock's antics and Partygate, where public anger very much focused upon the government, causing the party's numbers to start sagging down into the low thirties). But, you know, I think the difference between Barnard Castle and the mini-budget is that whilst the former angered a lot of people, the latter (or rather the market reaction to it) scared a lot of people, something that was compounded by Truss hitting the ground (so to speak) for nearly a week afterwards. You had the value of the pound crashing, the possibility of a number of pension funds becoming insolvent and mortgages being yanked off the market with the prospect of interest rate rises to come... and Truss was nowhere to be seen. I think that  cut through to a lot of people who would normally fall in behind the Conservative party as long as things were going okay for them personally.

[Cassius]

Who is favored in that case? Badenoch?

I have to think that even this Tory party will know better than to replace Thatcher 2: The Re-Thatching with Thatcher 3: Once More, with Melanin?

Actually I was thinking because of that. They could misread the entire electorate so much they think they can fix it by putting a POC in charge, since obviously no person could have an issue with their policies.

I, again, have to believe that the MPs, at least, aren't THAT stupid and extreme (it's pretty clear that the membership is), but while we're on this topic, I learned the other day that Kwarteng not only is the first black Chancellor but was the first black full Cabinet member (as in, not "also attending...") EVER when he was appointed BEIS Secretary in January of last year. There have been all-white slates of full Cabinet members as recently as 2014. That is pathetic, even for a country much whiter than the US or Canada.

That may be true of the Tories, but I'm certain Labour had a few.

Indeed, I believe the honour of first black cabinet minister went to Paul Boateng as Chief Secretary to the Treasury back in the Blair years.

[Cassius]

Amazing lack of content, so much so that she kept repeating herself endlessly, even though it was not a long speech.

Please tell me we got an update on those Beijing Pork markets.

https://twitter.com/mrjamesob/status/1577616497484222466

Cassius (LAB - UK)

[Cassius]

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/shortcuts/2022/oct/05/dictator-chic-why-did-liz-truss-wear-the-same-outfit-as-a-fictional-fascist

I think the Duargian is trying a bit too hard given the wealth of actual anti-Tory material that this conference has produced.

[Cassius]

Braverman did literally declare her candidacy for the party leadership in a live BBC interview whilst still serving as a cabinet minister under a Prime Minister who had not (at that point) declared his intention to resign, so it’s not surprising that she’s a loose cannon.

If Truss and Co screw this up would we get pound-dollar parity?

I think the end is pretty much nigh. I’m sure that there’ll be more attempts from Treasury/BoE to kick the can down the road, but I think at long last investors are wising up to the true weakness of the UK economy and are adjusting exchange rates accordingly for a more reasonable valuation of the pound (as, of course, they are also doing for the Euro). Whether it happens this week, next week, in a month or in a year I expect that it will happen.

[Cassius]

F**kin' ay:

https://twitter.com/KateEMcCann/status/1580268039643070464

After the scare they got from Theresa May, they should have at least vetted for charisma. Ridiculous.

Truss is much, much worse on that front than May.

[Cassius]

Thing is, Suella Braverman would be a better choice for leader than Truss, because at least she can deliver a sentence coherently and comes across as a (admittedly eccentric) human being, as opposed to a child's doll animated by the power of voodoo, as is the case for the latter. Plus, going full bore on anti-"wokeness", whilst it won't save the party from being taken to the woodshed at the next general election, is still probably less electorally cancerous than the Bride of Chucky's quarter-baked libertarianism.

The only argument I can think of for not getting ride of Truss is that it would be embarrassing to junk a leader so soon after the party junked the last one. Whilst that is true, on the other hand Truss' presence at Number 10 will be embarrassing for the party every single day that she remains there, so I think getting rid of her is a no-brainer. She's not going to change and become a well-briefed, charismatic leader with her finger on the pulse of public opinion, so the party may as well roll the dice again as its hard to think of anyone in the party who could be worse.

[Cassius]

The only argument I can think of for not getting ride of Truss is that it would be embarrassing to junk a leader so soon after the party junked the last one. Whilst that is true, on the other hand Truss' presence at Number 10 will be embarrassing for the party every single day that she remains there, so I think getting rid of her is a no-brainer. She's not going to change and become a well-briefed, charismatic leader with her finger on the pulse of public opinion, so the party may as well roll the dice again as its hard to think of anyone in the party who could be worse.

Getting rid of her *this* soon would make the Tories look utterly ridiculous, though.

(they do already, I know - but its still a consideration even so)

Ideally, she should be given enough time* for her total failure to be indisputable even to the most dim hack at the Barclaygraph - the question is if reality will allow that relative luxury.

(*which still doesn't mean *that* long, either - next summer at the latest)

Better to do it now when everything’s going to p*** in a kettle than to let her limp on into the middle of next year, fatally wounded and still fatally herself. Given that she appears to have fallen out even with Jacob Rees-Mogg, whilst other cabinet ministers are anonymously briefing against her, I don’t see how the party can possibly let her go on.

[Cassius]

https://mobile.twitter.com/JulianSmithUK/status/1580574612030517249

Former chief whip and key Truss opponent fires the starting gun.

[Cassius]

As a historical curio, if the unthinkable does happen and Truss does get rolled, this will be the first ‘Year of the Three PM’s’ since 1868, where we started off with the Earl of Derby, followed up with Disraeli and ended with Gladstone in office at year end (although there were three ministries in 1886, with a brief Gladstone ministry sandwiched between two led by Lord Salisbury).

[Cassius]

[Cassius]

The butterfly effect from eating a bacon sandwich was really something wasn't it.

I know this is a joke, but I would contest the theory that this specific to David Cameron winning and then launching the Brexit debacle...this is a massive structural problem that starts with the way British elites are formed. If the next Labour government doesn't do electoral reform and massively gut the Oxbridge mafia that run Britain, its just going to be the same sociopaths with red rosets who see the Thick of It as a training manual rather than satire.

The Labour shadow cabinet is rammed full of Oxbridge graduates (it might actually be more Oxbridge than the current cabinet, which might even be majority non-Oxbridge). Anyway, I think the Oxbridge debate is a bit of a red herring, but that’s a topic for another day.

[Cassius]

Here we go...
https://twitter.com/SimonClarkeMP/status/1580942174237077504

Zahawi seems to be going out to bat for her as well, once again showcasing his dreadful political judgement.

[Cassius]

I mean, this is UK General Discussion, not just the Conservative Party, so given the state that the country’s in (never mind the governing party) the only appropriate title can be:

We’re f*****.

[Cassius]

Unlike the Prime Minister, I'm not into being humiliated or dominated.

That being said, everybody can feel free to mock me for supporting Liz for Leader.

My calculation:

Sunak: 132
Truss: 116
Mordaunt: 108

Reality:

Sunak: 137
Truss: 113
Mordaunt: 105

To me this suggests there was no funny business.

Tbh, whilst the polls for Sunak don't look great at the moment, I think both Truss and Mordaunt are eminently beatable for him in the membership vote, particularly given a month long hustings. Mordaunt more so perhaps, as if you're on the right then there really isn't any especially good reason to vote for her over Sunak, but I don't necessarily think that Truss' right-wing posturing is the advantage that some assume it to be, given that the party membership has tended to back the more 'electable' candidate in past contests (with the exception of IDS vs Clarke in 2001).

Battle lines have been drawn between you and I, my friend.

You lost, Cassius. The new regime will purge you and your gang.

Oh what horrors await you at a gulag in Sunderland.

The reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.

[Cassius]

What's the record shortest tenure ever for a PM?  Asking for a friend

If Truss is rolled in the next few days then she will be the shortest serving PM in British history.