UK Politics

[steviewevie]

That unity didn't last long

[sheffinghell]

2 hours ago, pink_triangle said:

Seems a strange role for him as he is one of the best attack dogs Labour have, whoever the shadow health secretaries were they never laid a glove. There is often consensus about government and opposition about defence, however maybe defence spending will see more differences.

I'm guessing that a big part of the job is negotiating with the heads of armed forces rather than other politicians, and he will have the Chancellor on side. He also may have a bit more tech knowledge than many others in govt... I wasn't a fan of him in health (NHS employee), but he did have a big thing about AI and the like. 

[sheffinghell]

3 hours ago, steviewevie said:

Burnham has announced they will cut VAT to 0& on household electricity bills. Is that good? Good for customers I guess.

It's a good symbolic gesture and will help poorer households a little bit (I think someone said c. £45 a year). VAT on gas would help a lot more over winter months 

[lazyred]

6 minutes ago, sheffinghell said:

It's a good symbolic gesture and will help poorer households a little bit (I think someone said c. £45 a year). VAT on gas would help a lot more over winter months 

I suppose they want to make electricity cheaper to nudge people into moving away from gas. There is talk of switching the green levies from electricity to gas.  It doesn't help with bills right now though which is what they need to do.

[steviewevie]

32 minutes ago, sheffinghell said:

I'm guessing that a big part of the job is negotiating with the heads of armed forces rather than other politicians, and he will have the Chancellor on side. He also may have a bit more tech knowledge than many others in govt... I wasn't a fan of him in health (NHS employee), but he did have a big thing about AI and the like. 

 

[steviewevie]

30 minutes ago, sheffinghell said:

It's a good symbolic gesture and will help poorer households a little bit (I think someone said c. £45 a year). VAT on gas would help a lot more over winter months 

it's not exactly progressive, but it is definitely something that will get then positive headlines and off to a good start as opposed to everything is sh*t so we're going to take some money away from old people that came from Starmer and Reeves.

[lazyred]

One big problem for Burnham is that we are moving into the  austerity phase of Reeves plans. She met her fiscal rules by raising taxes at the start and pushed spending cuts to the end of the parliament.

The chart below compares our plans with other large economies. We are on the left of the chart with higher taxes used to reduce borrowing and no overall increase in spending. 

The new Govt can switch from deficit reduction to spending but they might break their rules.

 

https://taxpolicy.org.uk/2026/04/29/why-uk-taxes-are-rising/

 

 

 

 

[kaosmark2]

3 hours ago, pink_triangle said:

That seems to be harsh to me. What do you think someone can achieve in that job? I can’t remember many people who have had that role and have never got a strong feeling how successful they have been.

She could be managing online hate/twitter usage, she could be putting pressure on OFCOM to manage GB News, she could be regulating football agent spending, she could be working on standing capacity in stadia, she could be introducing regulations on social media misinformation, she could be working with schools around getting childhood sports programmes supported. There's thousands of little things she could have done and a handful of big things. She just hates this job and has decided not to do it, and Burnham is clearly fine with that.

[kaosmark2]

1 hour ago, sheffinghell said:

I'm guessing that a big part of the job is negotiating with the heads of armed forces rather than other politicians, and he will have the Chancellor on side. He also may have a bit more tech knowledge than many others in govt... I wasn't a fan of him in health (NHS employee), but he did have a big thing about AI and the like. 

And negotiating with Palantir who W*s is big mates with.

 

Less dangerous for people in this country than him being in health at least.

[kaosmark2]

Ultimately, Mahmood kept as Home Secretary, Phillipson kept as Minister for Equalities, and McFadden kept at the DWP says that Burnham won't make changes on the human rights stuff that pissed me off so much under Starmer's tenure. 3/4 of the roles where I was begging for a change and we didn't get them. There's a few good bits (Rayner in housing, Cooper in health), but this is a pretty bad weathervane for those of us who think immigrants, trans people, and disabled people deserve to be treated like human beings.

[steviewevie]

My sense is Burnham is a bit more of a liberal than Starmer, bit less likely to bash minorities, but we'll see. I think welfare reforms are coming though, and some people might not like it, balancing carrots and sticks to get people off welfare and into work, some of which might mean an increase in spending in some places.  I think focus will be especially on young people.

[steviewevie]

Also Mahmood was always likely to water down some of her more controversial proposals for changes to indefinite leave to remain etc., because there was going to be an almighty rebellion...so think that was coming anyway, whether it will be enough to get through we'll see. Not sure Burnham is going to be all open borders bleeding heart liberal on immigration though, he has the voters of Makerfield and similar to worry about, but immigration numbers are coming down, asylum seeker numbers are coming down, maybe it will become less of an issue for a lot of people. 

[lost]

35 minutes ago, kaosmark2 said:

She could be managing online hate/twitter usage, 

 

Aren't we already number 1 in the world for arrests for this type of stuff?

 

you've got to think any new laws are there forever and so if Reform get in your opening the door for say action against Bluesky over the Ann Widdecombe murder. This has happened time and time again. Thatcher used laws against striking miners that were introduced to stop the black shirts grouping.

[kaosmark2]

3 minutes ago, lost said:

 

Aren't we already number 1 in the world for arrests for this type of stuff?

 

you've got to think any new laws are there forever and so if Reform get in your opening the door for say action against Bluesky over the Ann Widdecombe murder. This has happened time and time again. Thatcher used laws against striking miners that were introduced to stop the black shirts grouping.

I don't mean on an individual level, where currently someone gets arrested if there's enough reports that the police decide it's more annoying to keep getting reports than to arrest someone.

 

I mean introducing a strategy of actually managing the platforms. Even though I dislike the Digital ID stuff and the Online Safety Act, why was Darren Jones doing it not Nandy?

[kaosmark2]

14 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

 I think focus will be especially on young people.

What's the last government that put any focus on young people except as punishment?

[steviewevie]

Some problems don't just disappear..good luck Yvette.

[steviewevie]

11 minutes ago, kaosmark2 said:

What's the last government that put any focus on young people except as punishment?

Starmer's when they reduced min voting age to 16?

[steviewevie]

Although could argue that's a form of punishment.

[kaosmark2]

3 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Starmer's when they reduced min voting age to 16?

That's not putting focus.

[steviewevie]

and they tried to "punish" the old c**ts by taking away their winter fuel payments to splash at the bar on their winter cruise or whatever and look where that got them. Starmer never recovered from that. Never f**k the old, and young people are just annoying.

oh, and

Youth Matters: Your National Youth Strategy - GOV.UK

[steviewevie]

1 minute ago, kaosmark2 said:

That's not putting focus.

not sure what that even means. It is a policy, so in that policy there is a focus there...if you want to take the pedantry to the normal stupid levels.

[Crazyfool01]

1 hour ago, kaosmark2 said:

She could be managing online hate/twitter usage, she could be putting pressure on OFCOM to manage GB News, she could be regulating football agent spending, she could be working on standing capacity in stadia, she could be introducing regulations on social media misinformation, she could be working with schools around getting childhood sports programmes supported. There's thousands of little things she could have done and a handful of big things. She just hates this job and has decided not to do it, and Burnham is clearly fine with that.

Thanks you’ve replied for me . Along with reform of the bbc board and political coverage . Just seems like she’s not doing anything …ofcom need greater powers in my opinion or actually just need to act at all 

[steviewevie]

Burnham's cabinet is more elite than Starmer's, hopefully that will lead to improvements.

[kaosmark2]

5 minutes ago, Crazyfool01 said:

Thanks you’ve replied for me . Along with reform of the bbc board and political coverage . Just seems like she’s not doing anything …ofcom need greater powers in my opinion or actually just need to act at all 

Yeah, all the sorts of things where people are upset that media/online places "just do what they like" would fall under her purview. All the sports stuff people talk about.

 

Tories generally do things at arms length because they don't believe in govt spend, but https://chancetoshine.org/ spoke to that department fairly heavily about what support could and couldn't come from government, and it did make an impact. It's the sort of role where if you're making an impact you don't attract headlines, but dozens of small positive things add up to reporters going "they've done this and this" and it gets acclaim from smaller commentators, those trying to do something related, and political nerds. In Nandy's case noone has a single thing to say about her other than "what's she doing? Anything?"

[steviewevie]