mattiloy

Whose Labour Party find themselves again outflanked on the left by the tories.

Neolib hawks like Sir Trilateral Commission KC

I often wonder about when was the sort of critical moment of mission drift for liberalism. In terms of interventionism, so intervening at first ostensibly to bring the world along on a journey towards democracy - but then ending up backing fascist war criminals just to keep the (often democratically elected) reds out from Batista to Pinochet to Kai Shek to Netanyahu today. But also in the domestic sphere- like when did liberals all get horny over the queen and nukes and hating trans people. There is this odd trend down the years of a reactionary regression towards authoritarianism under the aegis of protecting people’s liberty. At some point its like… whats the difference?

Hostage taking is bad, but genocide is worse.

Its actually quite disconcerting that the US and the UKs response to the ICJ’s (part of the UN) verdict is to tacitly support Israel’s conspiracy theory about parts of the UN having been infiltrated by Hamas by announcing a temporary cessation of funding. It seems almost too obvious that its intended to undermine the authority of the UN and by extension the credibility of the ICJ. And the UK govt endorses that. Its a dystopian direction of travel. The US and the UK responding to a ruling that there is a case to answer re: genocide by Israel, by throwing the UN and the ICJ on the bonfire too. Who needs international law anyway if its just telling you what you dont want to hear?

Isnt it a bit funny that supporting genocide is perceived as being beneficial to your chances of being elected. It seems like that would be something that would be harmful to a person’s reputation. I mean, at least Blair waited until he was prime minister before his complicity in genocide began in earnest…

https://x.com/women4wes/status/1749905514606084603?s=46 Women4wes doesnt miss

Thats weird because I thought it proved my point that the UK health system has worsening outcomes because its cash starved. Yes it is above the OECD average, but so is the UK’s gdp per capita. Dough! I have some good recommendations for primers in statistics if you’d like 👍 But yeah, lets get down to it. I get what you’re saying. We agree that there are worsening health outcomes in the UK. You started by backing the Wes Streeting nonsense that efficiencies were sufficient to remediate the issues. But you’ve ended up arguing that the only way to increase the health budget is by introducing an insurance based system. Which fine, its not the end of the world when done like france (Ie, lots of exclusions where poor, vulnerable, long term sick, then the state picks up the tab). But it IS less efficient because then it ends up being just like a means tested tax on working people but with an industry of middle men administrating it. Just increase tax. Or divert from trident or one of the many other completely useless fiscal black holes.

Right so based on f**k all then

🙂 I said the lowest per capita. Not the lowest % of gdp. The UKs gdp per capita is lower than most comparable countries - also the most recent % of gdp figure is a bit f**ked anyway because the uk’s gdp took a bigger hit from covid than most during a period where it also spent a f**k ton on health only to get a load of lousy ppe and a sh*tty app. Back in 2019 the total healthcare spend as a % of gdp figure you use (which includes private spending) was around 10%, the state element of that, as per my previous post was around 7% of gdp. https://amp.theguardian.com/society/2021/aug/04/nhs-drops-from-first-to-fourth-among-rich-countries-healthcare-systems The NHS has punched above its weight given the demand, and the starving of resources for too long. And thats sort of the point, make it sh*t, blame the system, introduce the private sector, all aboard the gravy train. You, the tories, Wes - in it together!

Says the undead Rentoul quoting somebody who maybe heard somebody say it. Ffs. https://ifs.org.uk/articles/labours-manifesto-spending-plans-are-impossible-cost Although I disagree with the ifs guy. It is possible to model the effect of the tax and spend, but it would probably be a PhDs worth of work to do so. And pointless if you never get to know the outcome.

They dont. The UK spends amongst the lowest per capita on health in the developed world and despite everything still has some of the best outcomes at the point of treatment. The problem is the wait for treatment. Waiting lists are too long and hospitals are overcrowded. The issue is simply that demand is greater than supply. The solution is more staff, more beds. That costs money. Or lets solve the problem of the UK spending more than avg on chronic illness? Well, the stuff that is solveable is related to lifestyle right? So how do you get people to change their lifestyle? Build more municipal facilities! Incentivise it! Educate people! All costs money. The debate is only who puts the cash in. Wes wants to let the vulture capitalists in so he can balance the books whilst hitting targets. But in the long term this always works out worse - more costly, worse quality. Because companies are always trying to maximise profit. The one quick way that the NHS could actually save dough is by clipping the wings of the private healthcare companies bleeding it dry and things like setting a fixed rate for all locum doctors- take it or leave it.

Lmao. This is completely f**king meaningless. Where did you get this graph? Torygraph? IEA newsletter? We SHOULD be spending more after inflation vs 1960, since real gdp has also gone up. Then the last jump on your graphs are just covid. The trend between 2000 and 2019 was from 5% to 7% in spend / gdp. Quite big. But the over 60 population has about doubled during that time. And people are living longer and with more chronic disease. The NHS do a fine job and prior to austerity were often ranked near the top in the developed world for outcomes vs cost. The NHS needs some reform. But it needs cash too. Indeed, it is hard to see how any organisation that size can dramatically change the way it operates without sizeable investment up front.

Idiot Streeting. 1) so the solution is presumably to spend a roughly equivalent amount on care in the community - 0bn saved 2) the solution is presumably to spend a lot more on training new staff (whilst also paying recruitment agencies in the meantime) - an initial 0bn saved (savings possible perhaps after the length of the labour parliament) 3) agree that outsourcing is more expensive and less effective than insourcing but spend will probs be roughly equivalent for the first years during transition before dropping a bit, maybe to 60% of the quoted sum. In any case - an initial 0bn saved 4) 32mil - fair enough. 5) Centralising supply of equipment a fine Idea but likely to end up in the middle, rather than at the bottom of the price range so if they’re quoting 1bn in savings, halve it. I think all of this is worth doing, but its not going to free up much money in the immediate term when the NHS is in fairly acute need. Get the chequebook out Wesley!!!

Starmer is in many ways Labour’s Theresa May.

You’re right, but only because Corbyn overperformed in 2017. Corbyn’s red wall vote in 2019 tracked in most places with the Labour vote in 2015. A return to trend. Examining the 2015 vote in my home constituency (red wall, labour) and those around it - it seems that Miliband was lucky then that ukip split the tory vote. Otherwise the tumbling of the red wall would have happened then. Theres also a pattern of Lib dem going from a consistent 10-15% in the 2000s to being virtually non existent after the coalition. I guess that lib dem vote got divided between labour and tories in 2015. Then probs in 2017 they got behind Corbyn a bit more and the ukip lot stayed at home, then in 2019 the lib dems stayed at home and the ukip lot swung behind Boris. I’d guess that the morale amongst the Brexit mob and the stomach for another fight has to be on the wane after almost a decade of it, whilst the liberals have been pissing their knickers over brexit and boris and all that for years now and will come out in force. So my prediction is that Labour’s vote in terms of numbers stays pretty static (2019 + liberals - left wing folk who stay at home) but then the tories’ numbers will fall off a cliff. So who knows in terms of swing - that depends on the turnout and the performance of the minor parties. But quite big. Its as in the bag as anything has ever been in the bag. It would take a phenomenal f**k up to lose it from here… 😁

Landlordism is a problem not because of individual landlords but because of the way that it diminishes housing supply which ends up driving up both house prices for purchasers, and somewhat paradoxically eventually rents: As a fairly stable long term trend of demand outstripping supply becomes apparent, manifested in increasing prices, it becomes more attractive to new BTL landlords - but the property prices have already gone up and therefore they need to charge higher rents to achieve the same yield that covers their mortgage costs - and then they too take another potential first time buyer home off the market (BTL properties are overwhelming those that would otherwise be first time buyer properties). This restricts supply further which puts property prices up which attracts new BTL guys, who pay the new price and get an even bigger mortgage with even bigger costs to cover etc etc etc This grim spiral is only true in a system where new housing stock is inadequate to bridge the initial supply gap (as in much of the uk). In a system where new housing stock is adequate, the initial trend would never have been established, so the expectation of never ending house price rises would not be there and there would not have been a big BTL craze.

Chris Grayling isnt the transport secretary anymore. Northern rail was taken over by the govt last year because arriva was too sh*t. The transport secretary is not involved in the operations of the rail companies. Be they nationalised or not. Why would a nationalised german rail company be more efficient than a british one? To paraphrase nick cave: I’m forever reading this forum thinking, what the f**k is this garbage? And the answer is always.. Neil.

Right, so there is no difference in those profits going to the treasury or to a canadian pension fund? Or whats your point?

He said he had the house 25 years in a previous post so thats what I used as the term. Then yeah I was vague with the exact % but I didnt expect so much scrutiny ☺️. The risk is small, but your exposure is 100%. If your one asset goes bad, your whole retirement is f**ked. If some companies in your fund go bad, you’re still getting 10 odd % a year. Thats the difference. It is good fortune alone that has rewarded B2L landlords in the 21st century, nobody could have foreseen such a prolonged housing bubble. But that fortune is on the wane. House prices have underperformed vs the market in recent years and are forecast to underperform vs the market in the mid term. Just on the financials it doesnt make sense. But we agree I think that on top of that landlordism is grotesque. Overall, if your financial advisor at any point said put all your money into B2L - you’d be best off getting a new financial advisor. The poster is lucky not to be much out of pocket if at all in monetary terms but if you billed all the hours spent managing the property, maintenance and the eventual costs associated with liquidating the assets, I think funds wins all day. And again, you dont have to live with being a landlord.

Would be a fine thing if I could. Unfortunately the history we’ve inherited has already been written by a bunch of bitter, selfish, economically illiterate chumps.

Do you honestly believe that the likes of Arriva - wholly owned by deutsche bahn - or Thames water - biggest shareholder a canadian pension fund - are investing more of their profits back into their uk businesses or the wider economy than the state? I’m trying to avoid personal insults this time but my goodness you are making it difficult.