He wasn’t going to stand, and then he is. Not daunted by his 7 time losing streak to date, it seems Clacton is the lucky recipient. Tice has agreed to go and sit on the subs bench for at least 5 years.
I assume our Nige has had a knock back from his orange American mate, and Reform were caught on the hop by Sunak calling an early election date.
Anyone for a milkshake?
I think he’s left it late to announce his standing so that it’s difficult to rustle up a dolphin to stand against him.
Clacton don’t let us down.
Has anyone in the history of British politics ever taken over as leader of a party and promised to hang around for five years?
Exactly the kind of long-term thinking the country is crying out for.
If his party gets one MP let it be him.
Brings a bit of colour to the next Parliament even though I disagree with almost all of his policies.
“Almost all”? Which ones do you actually agree with? Oh, and “brings a bit of colour” may well be a phrase you come to regret.
The man is a Wanker of the highest possible order and it is truly sickening to see him still gaining media coverage when he should be attached naked to a small boat , there to drift in a sea of vomit for ever and ever and ever.
Oddly enough the phrase “brings a bit of colour” made me think of a pile of vomit with diced carrots in it.
Do explain why you think the phrase “brings a bit of colour” is one that Wheaty may come to regret. Please do. I’d love to hear your thinking behind that.
I’ll state the bloody obvious – in Nigel’s world everybody is white including every single MP
And we had plenty of ‘colour’ with johnson and look where that got us.
I don’t like the man but sometimes our politics are so boring, he is the right wing version of Corbyn in my opinion.
I will vote Lib Dem as they may well get rid of a Tory where I live.
I want boring politics. Dull, boring, competence is exactly what I hope for from Starmer.
Yes please! Two or more almost indistinguishable parties, forever keeping each other in check. Tiny adjustments, long game, taking the electorate with you. All of that.
Labour have an ill thought out policy of adding VAT to private schools.
They claim 6000+ new teachers will be funded by this, spread across the 32,000+ state schools who get them. Lots of part-time job opportunities there then.
Many small private schools, including faith based schools, will probably have to close for to this as the parents cannot afford it..
I have an interest as my teenage SEN son goes to a private school that I happily pay for but he is not covered by the Labour concessions in their proposal.
It could price a significant number of pupils back into state education. That wouldn’t make things better.
I’ve had a gutful of ‘characters’, who offer personality but haven’t got a clue how real politics work. Ask the constituents of George Galloway, Michael Fabricant, Lee Anderson et al – they practice the politics of division but don’t spent much time at surgeries getting local stuff done unless there’s something in it for them. If Mr Toad gets in – and Clacton is ripe for his entreaties – I foresee a scenario like the Burnley BNP councillors, who spewed hate but didn’t turn up for their own tabled motions.
Farage was happy to take his massive Euro MP salary and pay his German wife as his secretary on the EU dime, all the while crowing about the wasted money the European Parliament took from Britain. He led UKIP on a card of pure racism. He sucks up to Trump. To quote Linda Smith, forget the oxygen of publicity, I wouldn’t give him oxygen.
My cousin lives in Clacton with her husband. Am guessing that will be 2 votes for Nige 🙁
My cousin lives in Clacton with his wife, small world. There is zero chance they’ll be voting for NF I’m proud to say.
So I guess we are not related through marriage?
Possibly not. My uncle – my cousin’s dad – was a dyed-in-the-wool Marxist until his dying day.
Linda Smith: I don’t really like you saying his name, because it gives him the oxygen of publicity and I’m not happy with him having the oxygen of oxygen.
My local mp is Fabricant and have to say there is one incorrect vowel in his name.
Couldn’t wish to find a more obnoxious twat to look after my interests
Hopefully he’ll get his arse handed to him on a plate yet again, but his profile will do harm to the Conservative vote nationwide without Reform winning a single seat.
My view too. I don’t think he’ll win anything but he’ll damage the Tories which can only be a good thing.
He has chosen Clacton for a reason. Unfortunately, I think he will win the seat and probably quite comfortably.
His influence is in the Tories panicking at losing votes to Reform, and once they have lost all the one-nation types, getting in a bunch of head-bangers just as Europe’s political trend is towards the right (note EU and rightish leaders across western Europe – and that’s before France finally falls for Mme Le Pen).
The social pendulum has been left in young people for a while, but I recall it shifting in the late 70s and early 80s. Yes, for us it was “Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, out out out”, Redskins records, Red Wedge, and a variety of other right-on student things – but outside out trendy bubble, not so much.
The fewer pop stars align themselves with Labour, the better.
It’s the kiss of death. Red Wedge lost more votes for Labour in the dire 1980s, than if Kinnock had been photographed having a slash against the Cenotaph on his way back from the pub.
I presumed Hillary Clinton would win in 2016… until I heard the words ‘Springsteen’ and ‘Madonna’.
Agreed.
See also Steve Coogan dismissing Labour voters who were disillusioned with the way the party was going in 2019 as “stupid”
Things Can Only Get Better and be heard less often. D.Ream on Keir. They have said no. I wonder if they have an alternative tune to fire them up? Stuck In The Middle? I’m sure Gerry would appreciate a bit of extra cash, he’s been awfully quiet of late.
Talking Heads – Road To Nowhere?
The Rutles – Living In Hope?
The Smiths – Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want?
When I saw Neil Kinnock doing his stadium rock act in the 1992 election, I knew he’d lost it. It made my skin crawl. The reverse is also true: Entertainment millionaires getting political.
“We’re alright! We’re alright! Wait…come back, everyone!”
Hilary won the popular vote so maybe they did help. They were though unable to change the strange US electoral system.
If Hillary had won, she’d probably have started a war somewhere. Or joined in on one.
I’m glad I’m not an American voter, having to make a choice between the weak and ineffective Biden and the barking mad narcissist Trump.
Isn’t it like the choice in UK – anybody but Sunak or Farage?
In the US, anybody, anybody but Trump.
Simples
Tough choice in the US for many I think, Trump, an apparently struggling, ancient Biden (with his son on gun charges) or anti-vaxxer Kennedy as a long shot.
It’s not a tough choice for anybody with an iota of sense…oh, forgot it’s the US
Yes
Meant to edit. Trump is a despicable moron but he is up against a very weak democratic candidate which is worrisome
A weak Democratic candidate with possibly the weakest VP since Dan Quayle just a heartbeat away from the hot seat
The Democrats don’t really have anyone of note, currently. The bland party.
Unfortunately I do agree that pop stars and celebrities don’t really help. I was brokenhearted to see the great Kenny Everett enthusiastically endorse Thatcher.
Corbyn had a chance in 2019 but he blew it because he had nothing to say on Brexit. He was good on other policies but when the big issue of the day is just deflected and ignored, you are not exactly going to win trust from the people over everything else.
He had lots to say on Brexit.
He just chose not to say it.
He was Brexit’s Kim Philby to Farage’s and Cameron’s Burgess and McClean
Seriously? In light of what has happened to Ukraine you’d retrospectively back Corbyn’s defence policies?
OK – I will rephrase – “good on some of his other policies”.
NF’s standing is bad news for Sunak and the Tories.
The possibility of his winning (and given that Clacton had if not the highest then one of the highest Out votes in 2016, he very well might) is potentially even worse news for the country.
One of the reasons the post-2019 Tory government has been so irredeemably awful is that there has been no opposition worth a damn.
Despairing of Corbyn and Momentum, Labour voters effectively gave Johnson carte blanche to run amok. Instead of checking Johnson’s worst excesses, Starmer has had to spend the last five years sorting out the plethora of problems left behind by JC and his mates.
The governance of the UK works best when the ruling party is held accountable by an effective opposition. If the Tories are obliterated on July 4, that isn’t going to happen for another five or maybe ten years.
What Farage is angling for is to get elected for Reform in the hope of being anointed as leader of what remains of the Tories and leading them ever more to the right.
Scary times
He said this was an emergency i.e. as the main shareholder of a limited company there’s an awful lot of money to be made ‘ere and we’ve only got 4 weeks! Donate to us because, er, we’re the underdogs and that!
Short term, for this election, this is great news for Labour. Farage’s profile will elevate the Reform Party’s vote nationwide and votes will come from the Conservatives voters who backed Boris Johnson last time.
Long term, for the Tories, I think this is also good. If they can hang on to 100-odd seats then it gives them an opportunity to let the right-wing side attach themselves to Farage. I don’t think Farage has a snowflake’s chance in hell of being leader of the Conservative Party.
Matt Hewer on the pale shadow that is what BBC cuts have left of the once-mighty Newsnight made the distinction that NF was angling to be leader of Conservatism.
Like him or loathe him and his disruptive, Farage will go down in the history of UK
politics as one of the most influential (and divisive) figures of the first. half of the
21st Century
Cometh the hour cometh the 🐬
Dolphin?
Indeed.
Dolphins are quite lovable though.
Don’t think the same is true of our Nige
Hubes is referring to the 2010 GE when Farage attempted to oust John Bercow from the Buckingham seat. As Bercow was Speaker the main parties didn’t stand. Despite that, turnout was a healthy 64.5%
In the event Farage got 8401 votes, finishing 3rd to an independent called John Stevens. Stevens campaigned in a dolphin costume, Farage was injured in a plane crash as he campaigned (illegally as I understand it) on election day. There’s probably a lesson in there somewhere, but if there’s one thing we’ve learned it’s that the electorate can be slow on the uptake.
https://members.parliament.uk/constituency/3376/election/19
Indeed I was.
Clacton here he comes.
@Gatz
Thanks for the clarification
I was in Hong Kong at the time. While the crash made the English papers there, the bit about the dolphin man didn’t.
Farage’s plane crash was one of the great what-ifs of modern political history.
Farage getting pelted with banana milkshake outside a Wetherspoons on day one of his campaign raises an interesting question or two.
– Is it okay if it’s Farage?
– Should the woman have been arrested?
– Why are the Left on X congratulating her? It’s a gift for his campaign.
– Why banana?
No
She has been arrested
It’s funny, and while it won’t harm him I don’t think it will attract any more support
Make the best of the materials at hand
Cue “funny” comment about it being nitric acid or petrol by people who would be appalled if someone said or did the same to, say, George Galloway or Jeremy Corbyn, as per Jo Brand the other year. As funny as haemorrhoids, and thuggish whoever does it. If Farage supporters start fighting the left back, the left will be quick to get upset. I do not want this turning into 1932 Berlin.
Yeah, the “it’s ok when we do it” crowd really are one of the worst things about modern armchair politics. Farage is a turd and also nobody should be assaulted, and if someone can’t hold those two ideas in their head at the same time, they need to go back to middle school to have it re-explained to them.
But “…fascism”. How often the folk throwing that word around seem to be projecting. ..
I note even “The Orange One” tried it last week.
Rational response: Yeh actually it makes us look like a bunch of dim thugs if we throw milkshake at people. We should probably stop doing that.
Actual response: Your tweet opposes MILKSHAKE but you didn’t oppose GENOCIDE in it therefore you are FASCIST
I have been reading that the milk chucker is known to Farage and a supporter of UKIP/Reform. Possibly a staged attempt by Farage to “own” the milkshake thing and/or get some coverage.
Alternatively, according to the S*n, she’s a Labour supporter with an OnlyFans account.
Do I care who or what she is?
Not really.
It’s a sideshow. Something for his detractors to snigger about and for his fanclub to harrumph about.
Farage is an unflushable turd in the lavatory pan of current UK politics. His importance is greatly exaggerated and we won’t be rid of him easily, even if he’s beaten by a more worthy opponent yet again.
I don’t think it’s ever ok, though I’m sure Farage is delighted even though he’ll have found it unpleasant. It’s just more publicity for him. The best strategy is to ignore him.
As I see it, Farage is a weed – resilient, thrives in the most inhospitable environments and most important, hard to get rid of.
The political terrain is barren, with a thin, inconsequential social media-inflected bed allowing no richness or depth of debate or mature growth, in a hostile climate of one-sided print media. Feed the soil with high quality, nutrient-rich interactions and well-informed considered discussions, lessen the harsh wind of client journalism – then other, more productive plants will grow.
As I’ve said about cummings and it applies to farge they are the Japanese Knotweed of politics, burrowing in to the foundations of democracy and breaking it apart.
As Arthur Fallowfield in the BBC radio comedy series Beyond Our Ken. replied to any question (in West Country accent) “The answer lies in the soil”.
That Starmer v Sunak debate was rubbish, wasn’t it?
Yes. By the second commercial break I got fed of them bickering with each other and turned over to Grand Designs. Rubbish format and poor host, but neither man put in a half, or even quarter, decent display.
“Interestingly”…Sunak claimed 12 times that an independent Treasury Report calculated that Labour would cost households an extra 2,000 pounds. This was a lie. It wasn’t independent (they were given assumptions by Special Advisers). They didn’t come up with that figure (the Tories extrapolated it to households) and they also said that their calculations are not to be used to score political points.
This is the interesting bit. Starmer didn’t fight back on that because he sensed it was a lie, or at the very least misleading. He did a time-honoured lawyery thing of getting the other party to repeat their lie again and again, so that they cannot say they were misquoted out of context. At the next debate I think Starmer should list the lies of Johnson, Truss and now Sunak.
He let them keep repeating the lie as he was already in possession of a letter debunking the claim from the Head of the Treasury which Labour released the very next morning.
If he had any sense, he’d have let Rishi repeat the falsehood and dramatically produced the letter during the debate
Nail on head @gatz
Quite depressing actually. Just wish Starmer had a bit of pizazz about him.
You should have seen the red button version, where they did it all again, but in the nip. With Anna Richardson asking the questions. Horses for courses, I guess.
That debate was terrible, mind-rotting stuff. I hope the truth about Sunak’s TCI hedge fund profiteering comes to light. No wonder the Tories fleeced the country for all they could take, if his ‘winner takes it all’ mantra was guiding financial policies during the pandemic. Awful, crowing, bitter man.
Not sure if this link will work – Starmer on Dead Ringers…
He was wooden and uninspiring though he had the odd moment. Sunak was awful but I can’t stand him at the best of times. The next one might be better with the deputies.
@Twang
Friday’s Raynor vs Mordaunt vs Farage and the rest might be more fun
Agree. And Daisy who is great.
@Twang
Bloody hell, seems like Ed Davey’s going all out for the trans vote
Billy Childish has done a poster – £30 and it’s yours
https://l-13.org/product/billy-childish-reasonable-debate-election-poster-farage/
I dun a lol.
Worth every penny…
@fitterstoke
Hate to break it to you, f, but he’s asking 30 pounds not 30 pence…
Erk! Gah!
I posted this on the political cartoonists thread but it belongs here too…
On a side issue, what has happened to Lisa Nandy?
Having gone toe-to-toe with Andrew Neil and more than held her own,
she was the best thing about Labour in 2019.
Pretty much sidelined by Starmer, she’s now reduced to being the go-to
Labour replacement if a more senior figure drops out.
Genuinely sad waste of potential by KS as LN was no Corbynite
I agree.
She is the acceptable face of Labour that might even get me to vote for them.
A rational intelligent women that has clearly pissed off Kier in the past.
His loss for the party.
What a strange decision by Sunak to come back from France for a pre-recorded interview.
The list of must-do events to be seen at to avoid the ire of the British public – and eventually even get the Daily Mail and Daily Express against a Tory P.M. – starts with ‘war’, at no. 2 is ‘royal family’, and the NHS, food banks, fuel bills, sewage in the water supply etc. necessarily have to find a spot somewhere below them.
I’m almost minded to watch the debate tonight to see how Mordaunt, whose seat is thought to be vulnerable to Labour, and who courts the Forces vote heavily spins this.
Wouldn’t it be great if she and Raynor leapt out from behind their lecterns and indulged in a Dynasty-style catfight?
While PM is what members of her constituency Conservative Association would doubtless describe as “a strapping gel”, Labour’s fiery-headed temptress would just shade it.
Meanwhile Farage would be cowering under the lectern, sucking his thumb and soiling himself. Also, Davey would be tap dancing in a sparkly leotard.
Rayner has no need to get involved. She can just stand back and watch Farage and Mordaunt slug it out.
Idea for Labour posters:
“Missing in Action”… picture of Starmer, Biden, Macron, etc. next to a silhouette of Sunak.
“Missing in Action”… picture of five Covid meetings with silhouettes of Fat Boy J. at each one.
“Missing in Action”… a lettuce next to a silhouette of Truss.
Or maybe just ‘go all Cummins’, the Australian cricket captain, i.e. do nothing and let the other guy make all the mistakes.
There’s two very striking ones out there :
1. RAF planes flying one way, the PM’s helicopter flying the other
2. A large white billboard – a small silhouette of Sunak walking away on the bottom right hand corner. Slogan “He Left Them On The Beaches”.
Visual of a gormless-looking Sunak dressed as Dad’s Army’s
Private Pike
Headlines could be
“They sought him on the beaches”
Or, better still
“Inaction Man”
Fist option presages Peter Brooke’s’ cartoon for tomorrow ‘s Times- troops arriving in landing craft as Sunak zooms off in a speedboat
These are v good but you know they won’t get used.
Gobsmacking to see that the best Conservative Central Office can come up
with for Penny Mordaunt to trot out is the already discredited UK£2,000
tax Increase. And the more she trots it out, the more desperate she and her
party look.
She’ll be picking out her costumes.for the next series of Strictly Come Dancing
before the night is out
Can’t stand the man or his horribly divisive policies but I can see why Farage is so popular.
I’m watching the Scotland Finland match rather than the debate (0-0 at half time if you were wondering) but have seen on Twitter that Farage described Starmer as ‘Blair without the flair’. That strikes me as not a bad line, and rather complimentary (though presumably that wasn’t Farage’s intention).
Gavin Esler says that all media interviews have been cancelled on Sunday by Sunak.
He’s either taking a day to lick his wounds in the hope that new things will come to the fore. Or, he’s stepping aside. Either way, a massive gaffe.
Another brewing scandal is the Chairman of the Conservative Party placing himself, uncontested, into the “safe” seat of Billericay in Essex. His current constituency in Durham has had its borders redrawn so he has to go somewhere else. Generally speaking, MPs in this position align themselves to one of the new constituencies in the same area. Billericay is 270 miles away. Seat number 2 for the Reform Party perhaps?
If like to say no, but I was in The Blue Boar, the ‘Spoons in Billericay, in the day that Brexit became law and the UK actually left the EU. Not a nasty vibe, though I didn’t exactly feel at home, but distinctly celebratory.
That recent comment by one M.P. about Tower Hamlets being a no-go area didn’t ring true with me at all. I must have gone to about thirty games at Clapton F.C., mostly in the evening, and I felt secure enough to go via the back streets to and from the ground.
Anything east of Stratford, or in the various satellite towns around London, and I was far more on my guard.