Greg2607

The NHS problem is also impacted by the use of agency staff at a much higher rate than the permanent staff. It's sold as "flexibility" for the bank staff. You could cut out that cost overnight in two ways. Either, nationalise the provision of agency staff and pay them the same hourly rate as an employed member of staff (the staff still have the flexibility they apparently want) OR provide flexible contracts within the NHS work force.. both do the same thing, which is cutting out the profiteering from the middle man. The "spare" money then goes to improving front line services. We are spending HUGE amounts of money to privatised elements providing (selling) services into the NHS at a higher cost than doing the same thing directly. It's bonkers.

Lack of hope is the majority factor. Take out the top 10% of earners from the statistics and the average wage in the UK is £24k. £2000 per month before tax. People struggle to build a life for themselves at that level of income. They can't afford homes, life is devoid of "luxuries". Based on ONS stats, 40% of the UK is living in deprivation. FORTY PERCENT!! Then, someone like Farage comes along and gives some simple rhetoric that everyone hooks into. None of this is a quick fix. Labour or not, it can't be solved in a single parliament, even across two parliaments. The structure of our entire society needs to change and we need LONG TERM planning. Something that governments of any colour fix to and continue to deliver around infrastructure, transport, industry, skills. If any business in the world changed what they did every 5 years, they would fail. It's impossible. BUT if you can build a society, where everyone benefits, where even the poorest are provided for, so they don't have to resort to crime to feed a family, then you may just about have a chance of changing the views of the disaffected when a wolf in sheeps clothing appears.

Oh I don't disagree, I was out campaigning and door knocking with her a couple of weeks ago.

No, it was always labour up until 2003, and then went Tory since that point.

Living in NW Leics, I'll take a fair amount of offence to this! It doesn't feel an overtly racist place to me. I could however see the Tory candidate getting a result. He's local and well known. Starmers being here recently says it's likely to be a close run thing.

alot fo the Chinese and Korean EV makers have stolen a huge march on the traditional car companies. they are proper pieces of kit now.... even xioami have just released a car which looks incredible (the SU7) - for context, thats a bit like Samsung or Sony releasing a car....

you aren't necessarily wrong here.... but at the very least he is definitely "Populist". I'm not sure I know enough about populism across the world to know how well that all plays out, but doing some research before I replied to this post there is a general consensus that " populist policies lead to adverse economic outcomes, as "economic disintegration, decreasing macroeconomic stability, and the erosion of institutions typically go hand in hand with populist rule."" now of course.... the populist would say that this is the elite pushing back against their agenda for change

my favourite Farage fact, which i've only just learnt.... is that once the Brexit result was announced, he naturalised himself in Brussels based on his residency status... so he isn't a UK resident anymore. absolutely blinding grift!

I've just taken the time to watch a livestream of Nigel Farage at the event where he unveiled that poster. Now, first of all, I will categorically state that I don't share his views. But.............. Of everyone in politics that makes it onto our screen, he is by far the most skilled orator. Stephen Flynn is up there as a comparison,, but I can absolutely see why "the ordinary bloke" buys in to him. He appeals to the disaffected and those that have previously thought "no one speaks for me". His language is simple, he doesn't shy away from saying the wrong thing for fear of backlash, if anything, the backlash helps to fuel his popularity, as he is a master of sparring back and making those arguments look stupid. I think there could be a shock around how many seats reform get. IF they fail to get many (and it's clear that Farage will become an MP in Clacton) then I could see a real push towards a new voting system coming in. In the eyes of the public, he will lend legitimacy to that debate. I really hope this doesn't build a platform for us to move towards a world where Farage becomes a future leader of the country. If you look at how facism is defined more recently it's this.... "a cult of the leader who promises national restoration in the face of humiliation brought on by supposed minorities and immigrants who are supposedly posing a threat to the character and the history of a nation" and that "The leader proposes that only he can solve it and all of his political opponents are enemies or traitors. It sounds scarily familiar when you frame it in those terms...

The Right and Rightof center parties aren't used to having to share the same territory are they.... one of the reasons the Conservatives have been so successful over the years is because they have generally been the only part of merit on that side of the divide so get a larger share of the overall vote. If the Left and Left of Center parties had always coalesced into a single party, rather than having the various different shades of Left Wing views across multiple colours, then they would have seen more time in power over the years. There is a reason that the Conservatives have been in power for 75% of the last 100 years.... it's because it's easier for them to get a lions share of the vote in a FPTP system... i'm particularly enjoying all of them howling at the moon about who is being honest or dishonest.. it's fun to watch for a change...

It's felt like it's generally been a healthy discussion and exchange of views up to this point of I'm honest. I hope we can continue in that vain for the next couple of weeks. That or I'm going to have to resort to yelling at people on twitter to stay sane 😂

Cooper is held in the same regard at Forest as Pearson is for Leicester.... mainly because he got them to where they were, from the doldrums into the premier league.... Potter didn't do that for Brighton, albeit he helped to establish them there. Pearson has not had huge amounts of managerial success after Leicester, yet a proportion of our fans would welcome him back with open arms at every opportunity.... It doesn't necessarily mean that he would achieve the same things. I suspect the same could be said for Cooper... we just don't know how he is going to do in his next role. Obviously, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, I hope that he manages to keep us up and start to build the squad into one which resembles a premier league outfit again, but time will tell... I've said previously, I'd have much preferred Moyes who has a track record of this over a 20 year period... but who knows... maybe cooper is the next moyes... none of us REALLY know the answer to that!

Where on earth is the workrate??? The first thing you have to do is earn the right to play the game your way... We are SO passive it's unreal.

As some people have said, there were a number of Forest fans that were sad to see him go. From my understanding of it, he certainly galvanised the fan base and had the players working hard. Given the state of our squad this year, we are going to want to see a bit of fire and brimstone in our performances. Players running through walls for the team and "hopefully" being more than the sum of their parts. Fingers crossed he can bring a bit of this to the team. If he doesn't then I suspect he will pay the price for it. We have to accept that we are starting again as a club. the last 10 years can be chalked up to history now and we have to build a competitive squad all over again. this is what being a Leicester fan is right??

I was at an event yesterday looking into this. There is actually more businesses that are supporting the recruitment of ex offenders than you think. Timpson and Marston's gave good talks around this.

I wouldn't read In to this TOO much... It's a poll of GB News viewers. It's literally Reforms target audience. It would be like doing a poll of New Statesmen readers and seeing labour on top... It's how it should be.

here's the other INSANE thing that is happening thanks to the performance of our economy recently.... there is now such a disparity in salaries in the UK versus the US, that US firms are outsourcing work to the UK, as it's far cheaper for us to do it for them, than for them to do it with local staff. a Manager of a Taco Bell in the US is earning on average around $100,000.... circa £80k...... it shows just how far we have fallen.

You may well be right... I do think we've become inherently selfish as a society. We don't tend to "help our neighbours" in the way that I was used to growing up (albeit, I'm only 42) - But I think because a lot of people's lifestyle sit on a pretty precarious balance, we choose the options that suit us the best. I guess that's human nature.... but it's a bit ugly...

My Mrs has recently started watching "Rich House, Poor House" on Netflix. I'd never seen it before, ubt it does make quite compelling viewing. I suspect the vast majority of people that have disposable wealth, don't realise they are SO MUCH better off than the majority of the country. I also suspect, they really can't imagine a world where a family has £60-£70 a week to may for food and activities once all of the bills have been paid. Most of the "Rich House" participants have around £1300 a week to just spend. (after bills) They assume everyone who is like that, is a feckless layabout, with no ambition and just "living a life of benefits". I watched a show last night, where a woman with 3 children, is living in a 2 bedroom flat in South London. Two of her kids share a room obviously, and her 3rd child who is 15, is sleeping in the lounge. Now, for that 15 year old, regardless of her ambition, ability, or aspiration, has absolutely no space whatsoever in the flat to do homework. Her mum couldn't afford to buy her a laptop to do school work and even if she could, her daughter was looking after the two younger kids in the evenings so her mum could go out to her 2nd job, just to be able to put food on the table. £80 a week she had spare to provide for her family. that's an example of how broken society is in places. A single mum, having to work two jobs to live in an unsuitable property and have £80 a week spare after bills. A daughter, who's destiny in life is strongly linked to her current situation. She's unlikely to do be doing well at school, albeit, through no fault of her own. I don't think that large parts of the population realise that those kind of situations exist and it feels entirely wrong and unjust to me.

There is absolutely zero certainty in what I'm about to say, so take it with a very large pinch of salt.... However... I was at the KP this morning as there was a business event that I was attending. As I was leaving, there was a club photographer leaving the main reception, with a massive flash and all his camera gear. As he walked out the door, he said "I guess I'll see you all tomorrow again by the sounds of it".... Clearly, could be linked to something different and I assume they would do photos at seagrave (unless they want something in front of the stands) - but IF he was there taking photos of the new manager.... We will likely know in 24/48 hours.

Quite honestly.... the ONLY way to do that is to address the inequality that exists in our society. More money has to flow from the Rich (and I mean Super Rich) to society in general. literally no one on this forum would be impacted by a policy that looks to impose taxes onto wealth at the super rich level. Tax people with Wealth above £50m for example and ONLY tax them on how much that wealth grows per year.......... if your £50m wealth earns you £5m.... then I'll tax you £1m of it.... your overall wealth has still GROWN by £4m.... the inequality gap is widening at an alarming pace and that is why the vast majority of society is seeing their standard of living decrease...... it is that standard of living decrease that causes people to look for the alternatives from people in power who promise to rectify the situation. It also causes them to become more selfish in their decision making, as they are trying hard to survive and keep their head above water. but guess what happens when the super rich retain all of their wealth.... they buy stuff with it... in order to generate more wealth... things like houses for example.... want to know why house prices aren't coming down? because people with £millions can still afford to buy them, by the bucket load and then rent them out. the asset maintains it's price. even worse than that, it means we have a generation of people now, who are still living at home in their 30's and when they do eventually buy a house, they have a massive mortgage which prevents them from affording kids, or planning for retirement, or spending money down the shops... the problem just compounds itself. as a whole.... I don't think people who "want our country" back are ACTUALLY talking about it being 99% white.... they want affordable housing... or a social provision such as council housing. they want to be able to feed their family. access a GP. get treatment on the NHS. they want public transport that works. It's a travesty that there were over 2 million visits to foodbanks in 2023 and even more so that 70% of people receiving benefits are in paid employment.... how have we managed to build a society where having a job, doesn't actually provide a level of income that doesn't need topping up by the state. It is literally the government propping up business. it's just that these types of people have bought into the belief that it is "johnny foreigner" that is causing these problems, rather than successive governments not spending enough to provide those services. Privatisation of national services such as utilities didn't help either... but's let not go down that track.

Parties like Reform appeal mainly to the disaffected, or those who feel let down by the main stream parties. They generally have simplistic slogans, and policies that on the surface look attractive to the "average" voter. If you were on minimum wage and living on £50 a week after bills.... guess what.... raising income tax above £20k is probably really appealing..... if you've bought into the narrative that illegal migration has caused all of societies ills (spoiler alter, it hasn't) then you would be happy for them saying they would deport everyone and have immigration as zero. it's how brexit manifested and got delivered... it was built on slogans, untruths and down right lies at times.... but it appealed to enough people to happen... THAT is the fear... that this builds momentum and becomes a mainstream party that is elected in 2029 when things haven't changed that much over the next 5 years....

depending on your strength of feeling towards (or against) the tories and you are feeling like you don't quite know how to vote, then this website can always tell you your tactical vote to NOT return a Conservative MP. https://stopthetories.vote/ Of course, that might not be your position at all. Alternatively, if you happen to be in a seat, where the incumbent is as safe as safe can be (and you wouldn't vote for them) , and you'd rather vote for a party in a seat where they have a chance of winning, then you can always swap your vote and have it matched in a seat where it might make a difference. https://www.swapmyvote.uk/

apologies @Raj i promised i'd do this last week, but here is another In Depth on the labour Manifesto - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cyxx1lq50nlo again, in the interests of balance and allowing everyone to make an informed choice - This is Plaid Cymru (in case we have any welsh foxes) https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crgg1z4n2vno Green Party https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/czddq40z2zno Conservative https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/crgglmwwlggo Liberal Democrat https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqeevzldj0jo They haven't yet done one for Reform.... but if they do I'll post it. Now..... elections are at their most powerful, when the people choose to actually vote. To have their say. Clearly, we won't all agree (it's impossible for us to!) but if you don't get out and vote, regardless of the party that you vote for, then you can't complain if the party that does get in, does things that you don't agree with. TODAY is the last day that you can register to vote. It's super simple to do. https://www.gov.uk/register-to-vote I'm very much a Labour voter (mainly when they are more centrist) but I don't hold any ill will against people that see the world differently to me, it's what makes us all human at the end of the day. I have to say, I've enjoyed having a Political Thread back on the forum and I've also enjoyed the fact it hasn't descended (yet) into mud slinging and name calling. SO to all of you who are contributing in a grown up way. Thankyou.

It's the danger of populism isn't it. You can say whatever you want when you don't have to actually implement it and people go "yeah actually that sounds great".... They then vote for thing that sounds great, but can never be a reality and eventually, because the party in power can't deliver what the populist party are advocating for, they get into power. At which point, we are out of the echr (goodbye to all of your current holiday and employment rights) Private healthcare arrives. And we basically become a pariah state. The scariest thing is that I can see a path to this being a reality.