Ship of Fools: Can the Tories survive?

Thread: Can the Tories survive? Board: Hell / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

So the Tory government in the UK lost the Michael Fallon to a sex scandal last week, have lost Priti Patel yesterday because she was engaged in covert foreign discussions.

Meanwhile, Boris Johnson is refusing to accept responsibility for the fact that his comments have probably landed Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe in prison for anothe rfive years (which is a disgrace, and he should be sacked), and David Davis is not sure of the actual existence of documents he claimed he knew about, but he hasn't read because he can't be bothered to do his job even in a half-arsed way.

And Theresa May appears les and less in control of anything. There have been suggestions that she didn;t really get a say in the appointment of a new Foreign Minister. And there has been sttrong criticism of her letting Patel resign, rather than be sacked.

So is there any hope at all for this corrupt, out of control, lame-duck administration?

I hope not.

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

Unfortunately, the Tories are political survivors. The party has always (well, in my lifetime anyway) managed to pull themselves together just enough to totally collapse. And, they have no problems with totally wrecking the nation and the lives of the people who live here to do so. Need to address differences over EU membership? Drag the entire nation through a rushed, expensive and divisive referendum. Need a new leader? Pick someone who's only qualification is she's not clearly aligned with any particular wing over Europe, an inability to lead isn't important.

I hope the Tories have managed to fatally wreck their ability to be elected to government for a generation. But, I'm not hopeful that they won't hang onto power too long - they're not going to call a new election early. And, that will mean we don't get the chance to kick them out before they drag the nation kicking and screaming through a Brexit no-one but the idiots in their party (and the slightly saner members of UKIP) want.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

the maths is the tough bit really:

1. if they can somehow hang on then the Fixed Term Parliaments Act means they don't have to do anything for another 4.5 years.

2. the DUP have said openly that they won't do anything that puts Labour in Downing Street, so they're unlikely to collapse the deal

3. Worst case scenario is not actually the Tories staggering on IMO - the worst case scenario for everyone is the govt collapsing, deciding it's Labour's go, refusing to support a vote for a General Election, and forcing Labour to run some sort of minority administration with the larger Tory/DUP block harrying them and voting down everything *except* a confidence motion for half a decade, while leaving the Labour govt to own Brexit.

4. This is the real killer for everyone involved. The Tories are in utter, utter disarray, but they haven't tanked in the polls. Depending on which ones you believe, it's pretty even or they're not far behind. That, IMO, is simply because half the country doesn't like the people at the top of the Labour party. If they're honestly prepared to keep voting blue through the current nightmare then frankly it's not just the Tories that have got an existential problem - not enough people *seem* to want what Labour are selling at a time when Labour supporters are the most energised they've been since 1997 and the govt is doing it's best impression of one of those collapsing clown cars. Albeit a nightmarish one rather than one that's being collapsed for the entertainment of the public.

Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :

Not true: Brexit was wanted by most of England and Wales, It just wasn't wanted by Scotland, London and Northern Ireland. The areas to the east of London voted for Brexit with a higher majority than most areas in the country.

Suzamme Moore argues that Britain is currently ungovernable with its current divisions, whilst Owen Jones argues that the Tories have lost their ideology as their previous policies have left the country stagnating, so they have to decide whether to preach that same ideology with more zeal or to change it.

Sadly, Priti Patel's shenanigans have taken the focus off Boris Johnson's latest gaffe, which has almost certainly added several years to the sentence of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and should have finished him off.

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :

Not only will they survive as Callaghan and Plucky Johnny Major did, she will win a second term. (And Oi! Alan! Dead Horses!).

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by betjemaniac:
...refusing to support a vote for a General Election, and forcing Labour to run some sort of minority administration with the larger Tory/DUP block harrying them and voting down everything *except* a confidence motion for half a decade, while leaving the Labour govt to own Brexit.

If current Commons voting patterns are anything to go by, that's pretty much what the DUP are doing to the Tories right now.

quote:
The Tories are in utter, utter disarray, but they haven't tanked in the polls. Depending on which ones you believe, it's pretty even or they're not far behind. That, IMO, is simply because half the country doesn't like the people at the top of the Labour party.

It's not the people so much as the policies. If Labour was preaching a more Blairite set of policies then they'd be in the lead by a mile, but the sort of old-school-blood-red-redistribute-and-nationalise-everything crap they're coming out with is never going to win an election as long as there are enough people who are well off enough to believe they'd lose out if it happened.

Posted by betjemaniac (# 17618) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
It's not the people so much as the policies. If Labour was preaching a more Blairite set of policies then they'd be in the lead by a mile, but the sort of old-school-blood-red-redistribute-and-nationalise-everything crap they're coming out with is never going to win an election as long as there are enough people who are well off enough to believe they'd lose out if it happened.

True, although I'd argue (especially in this case) that people set the policies.

I do believe that if Labour were running as New Labour they'd be so far ahead of the Tories as to annihilate them in a GE. However, this is also the left's best chance for a generation to have a go at winning from the left, and taking the hard road to potentially screwing up a gift for an Opposition seems to be more important than winning an election....

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

It is getting harder to make fun of Americans for their political clown.

Posted by Bishops Finger (# 5430) on :

Dear God, yes... [Disappointed]

And not only did we (or some of us) vote for these bloody people, but we actually pay them money.
[Mad]

Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :

Of course the tories can survive; they're harder to get rid of than cockroaches. They're harder to get rid of than bed bugs. And less welcome than either.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

Undoubtedly. The Tories will do anything to survive. Denigrating the opposition through the press which (for the most part) they own with cries of "The Red Menace" has been a staple since the Zinoviev letter in the 1920's. As for the Labour manifesto that is c 90% Scandinavian Social Democracy.

The EU referendum was the latest illustration of the willingness of the Tories to run the country into the ground in the interests of the party. Quite what they will point the finger at when the Breckshit hits the fan I don't know.

Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :

Apparently the proposed boundary changes to reduce the number of seats in Parliament to 600 (from 650) have stalled for redrafting - either version benefits the Conservatives.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Sioni:

quote:
The EU referendum was the latest illustration of the willingness of the Tories to run the country into the ground in the interests of the party. Quite what they will point the finger at when the Breckshit hits the fan I don't know.

*Obviously* when they get tired of blaming the (rest of the) EU for not rolling over and playing dead when David Davis told them to, they will blame the "Remoaners". The Daily Heil has already branded anyone who dares to even suggest that it might not be in the nation's best interests to leave an 'enemy of the people'.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

Not sure that the sorting out Trade Union dogma post- 70s, or the clawing us back from the 08 debacle,(which happened under Labour), quite qualifies as driving the Country into the ground.

But hey ho it's all relative, and dependant on where we place the measuring stick.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

I don't see how the present government can actually manage the Brexit negotiations with any coherence or authority.

The Northern Ireland border with Eire is a classic example of them wanting their cake and eating it. And you can't negotiate that way. EU officials are saying, quite reasonably, that it's easy to avoid a hard border, if Northern Ireland abides by the single market and customs union provisions, but impossible in any practical sense if it can't. Nobody can see any kind of fudge which would work. And the DUP is staunchly pro-Brexit! No way they will agree to that.

Posted by balaam (# 4543) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
or the clawing us back from the 08 debacle,(which happened under Labour), quite qualifies as driving the Country into the ground.

The Lie of Labour's recession raises it's head again.

It was a worldwide recession, Labour did not cause the collapse of the economies of Greece and Iceland, nor the near collapse in Portugal, Spain and Ireland, or, more significantly USA.

The largest of these economies, that of the USA, must have had the most significant effect. The 2008 recession happened after nearly 8 years of the right wing policies of George W Bush on the world financial markets. In the end even Dubya had to resort to the left wing tactic of nationalising companies such as AIG, given his policies prior to this, that must have really hurt Bush Jr.

Labour was guilty of not properly regulating the financial sector, but Labour was not guilty of sub-prime lending, which had such a large effect on the recession. The blame for that lies fully with the banks.

Just because David Cameron used the phrase "Labour's recession" in two general elections and won does not make the phase any less of a lie.

PS I am not a socialist.

Posted by Anselmina (# 3032) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
It is getting harder to make fun of Americans for their political clown.

Yes. The Houses of Parliament seem to have become a factory for churning out arseholes and arseholery.

There are some hard-working, good people there, of course. But they don't appear to be the ones running the country.

Britain should have a new flag; an image of a headless chicken running around in circles.

Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on :

It seems to me that there are a band of people who are in an exclusive political class - which includes politicians but also various other wealthy and powerful people - who are hell-bent on destroying this country.

For two reasons: first they don't give a shit. They live in a gated community, they have apartments overseas, they have more money than we could possibly imagine, they're offshoring this and that and the other. If stuff gets bad here, they're not going to be in the line at the foodbank. They're not going to be trying to get through to the Universal Credit line. They're not going to have to go to a degrading interview with an anonymous official to prove that they're too sick to work. They have one foot in some distant paradise somewhere, all that they'll have to do if it gets too hot here is to cast off and not look back.

But secondly, it is becoming increasingly obvious that this same group of people who are so committed to the most ridiculous Brexit, the most stupid shoot-ourselves-in-the-head economic policies, the most rarr-rarr British nationalism (beat off those foreigners at the borders) not only don't really much care what happens with this country, they're actually profitting from the impeding chaos. They want the NHS to go down in flames - because there is money to be made from the bonfire. They want to push poor people into poorly paid work, because there is money to be made in profiting off the back of the underpaid.

And that, right there, is the rump of those in charge in the Tory party. That's where their ideology comes from. That's where the financing comes from. That's the god they're bowing down to.

And all of those poor saps who voted Tory/UKIP and voted Brexit because they believed the neo-fascist bullshit which proclaimed that all the problems they were facing were not due to the true-blue Tory bastards who are ripping the heart out of the Welfare State whilst providing McTesco jobs to keep people in poverty (oh no, of course it can't be those flaming job creators! They're bringing in the wealth) but instead was the fucking foreigners who are actually keeping this country afloat - those poor saps are going to get a rude awakening when the rats leave and life gets progressively worse.

Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
It's not the people so much as the policies. If Labour was preaching a more Blairite set of policies then they'd be in the lead by a mile, but the sort of old-school-blood-red-redistribute-and-nationalise-everything crap they're coming out with is never going to win an election as long as there are enough people who are well off enough to believe they'd lose out if it happened.

But the majority of the public supports nationalisation of rail and energy. If YouGov's sample is representative, then the reason why Labour don't have a majority in the polls is that a significant bloc of people support nationalisation but don't trust them to do it right, or else object to some other aspect of their policies.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

quote:
Originally posted by balaam:

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
or the clawing us back from the 08 debacle,(which happened under Labour), quite qualifies as driving the Country into the ground.
The Lie of Labour's recession raises it's head again.

It was a worldwide recession, Labour did not cause the collapse of the economies of Greece and Iceland, nor the near collapse in Portugal, Spain and Ireland, or, more significantly USA.

I get that, the Electorate in 2010 clearly did not.
The lies TB used to get us into Iraq may have been part of the reason it was not going to forgive Labour for 08. Then again the pleading that is was only going to be a shallow recession didn't help much.

The only thing which will put Labour back in the driving seat is the total failure Brexit. 5 years is of course a long time to hold the breath on that one.

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
Apparently the proposed boundary changes to reduce the number of seats in Parliament to 600 (from 650) have stalled for redrafting - either version benefits the Conservatives.

There is an easy way to cut 50 or so seats from the Commons. Scottish Independence. That also benefits the Conservatives - their proportion of the remaining seats will likely increase without the traditionally more left-wing Scottish seats out of the picture. Not having to be associated with the arseholes in Westminster will probably help make the Scottish Conservatives more electable here as well. And, it removes that uncertainty about if and when Scotland will seek independence. Win-win-win.

Posted by Sioni Sais (# 5713) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:

quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
Apparently the proposed boundary changes to reduce the number of seats in Parliament to 600 (from 650) have stalled for redrafting - either version benefits the Conservatives.
There is an easy way to cut 50 or so seats from the Commons. Scottish Independence. That also benefits the Conservatives - their proportion of the remaining seats will likely increase without the traditionally more left-wing Scottish seats out of the picture. Not having to be associated with the arseholes in Westminster will probably help make the Scottish Conservatives more electable here as well. And, it removes that uncertainty about if and when Scotland will seek independence. Win-win-win.

That sorts out the overall number of seats but it doesn't address the underlying problem, which is the uneven number of voters in constituencies.

Redrawing is expected to benefit the Tories but I'm not so sure, By carving up the existing constituencies on a ward by ward basis might, depending on how they are subsequently combined result in more marginal seats, which then makes the outcome less predictable.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Sioni Sais:
That sorts out the overall number of seats but it doesn't address the underlying problem, which is the uneven number of voters in constituencies.

Exactly. Scottish Independence would just mean the Commons would have to reduce from 600 to about 560 seats in order to achieve equality between constituencies.

Posted by Bishops Finger (# 5430) on :

Even if nothing else comes of the current brouhaha, the sacking of Bojo the Clown would just make my day.... [Mad]

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

The thing about redrawing the boundaries is that it is intended to benefit the tories - another attempt to keep them in power whatever.

Of course the real problem is the FPTP system. If you are serious about making the voting system fairer, some alterntaive is needed. Of course, that is not what the Tories are doing it for.

Posted by ThunderBunk (# 15579) on :

Yes, because the UK seems to have decided that repeated, impenetrable, culpable, inhuman fuckwittry is the way forward.

Recreational pharmaceuticals are the only possible means of survival.

Posted by Bishops Finger (# 5430) on :

This is Hell, so am I allowed to suggest that Catesby, Fawkes, et al, were thinking along the right lines?

[Paranoid]

A plague on all their houses.

IJ

Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Bishops Finger:
This is Hell, so am I allowed to suggest that Catesby, Fawkes, et al, were thinking along the right lines?

A plague on all their houses.

IJ

You can suggest whatever you like, and I will continue to suggest that this sort of excuse for political thought is what allows the tories to get away with doing their horrible shit time after time. Labour are not perfect, by a long shot, but right now there is a clear difference between them and the excuse for a government currently in office (and not in power).

Posted by Ian Climacus (# 944) on :

I was just hearing a bit more in-depth about Patel's activities.

Was she relatively new? Or just foolish? Even if new, I can't imagine not seeking approval for seeing the people she saw. It is just so...sorry... incompetent.

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

She's a new-ish MP, elected in 2010. She served in two minor ministerial roles in the Cameron Cabinet. Her previous employment started with some work as a press-officer for William Hague, and a couple of PR jobs. Those PR jobs gave her some international experience ... giving positive spin on British American Tobacco funding the Burmese dictatorship, and Diageo.

It was an appointment that seemed to be primarily because she was a vocal supporter of the Leave campaign, and May needed to balance her Cabinet to include lots of Leavers. Except there are relatively few Leavers in Parliament and her options on ability and experience were limited.

Posted by Ian Climacus (# 944) on :

Thanks Alan.

Posted by Rocinante (# 18541) on :

Yeah, May has to have equal numbers of leavers and remainers in her cabinet, and that's how she keeps the peace in Dodge.

It makes the average competence level even lower than it otherwise would be, though.

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