Introduction
I suppose that I should write a brief piece about the LibDems, now that they have elected a new leader. Somehow an underwhelming topic. First of all, the new leader.
Background
Jo Swinson MP was born in Scotland in 1980, went to a local state school and then to the LSE, graduating, it seems, aged only 20, and with a degree in management. She then worked briefly for a small enterprise in Yorkshire before becoming marketing manager with public relations duties for a local radio station in Hull, called Viking Radio.
Elected as MP in 2005 [LibDem, East Dunbartonshire], she was PPS to Nick Clegg, then a PUS, then a junior minister, all during the time of the “Con Coalition” of 2010-2015.
Jo Swinson voted for all or almost all of the Con Coalition policies, and has endorsed both zero hours contracts and “flexible working”. I am not a LibDem, but I have to say that Jo Swinson is really rather far from the LibDem traditional stance on such matters. She comes across as almost “libertarian” as far as worker rights are concerned.
The other candidate, Ed Davey, is not far from Jo Swinson, ideologically, though I should say that Davey was the more intelligent candidate of the two, so it makes sense for the LibDems to go for the less-intelligent and less-educated Jo Swinson…Davey was also the more experienced candidate, being about 15 years older and having been in Parliament for longer (since 1997, compared to Swinson’s 2005); Davey was also the only one to have served in the Cabinet.
Both Swinson and Davey lost their seats in 2015 (Davey to a Conservative, Swinson to the SNP), but were re-elected in the same constituencies in 2017. Both are “doing rather well” financially outside politics too: Davey is director or consultant to a number of companies, while Jo Swinson’s husband, Duncan Hames, an accountant (and also a LibDem MP from 2010 until 2015), now works for Transparency International, a well-funded NGO.
The LibDems’ situation and chances
2010 was surely the high point of LibDemmery. 57 MPs (out of 650) and a share in government: the Con Coalition. In 2005, under the egregious Charles Kennedy, the LibDems had won 62 seats out of 646, but were not in government.
The LibDems got 23% of the popular vote in 2010, but only about 9% of the MPs.
I believe that the LibDems could have demanded electoral reform from the Conservatives. They did not. They sold their chance for a few ministerial places, for official cars, red boxes, rank and flummery. In return they (Ed Davey and Jo Swinson among them) voted for every misconceived “Conservative” measure: the appalling regime of hounding of and cruelty to the poor disabled, sick and unemployed; the whole nonsense of “austerity”, which left the UK economy almost alone in advanced states in being mired in recession and/or low growth for years; the near-destruction of the armed services as an active and effective global force. For all that and more, for being doormats for the Conservatives, the LibDems were punished by the electorate.
In 2015, the LibDem vote slumped to 7.9% (8 MPs), then slumped again in 2017, to 7.4% (but, by the vagaries of the British electoral system, the LibDems ended up with 12 MPs).
In the 2019 UK European elections, the LibDems came second. I blogged about them then:
https://ianrmillard.wordpress.com/2019/05/29/eu-elections-2019-in-review-the-libdems/
but they failed fairly miserably at the Peterborough by-election a week or so later:
https://ianrmillard.wordpress.com/2019/06/08/a-few-peterborough-afterthoughts-about-the-libdems/
I do not think that I have a lot to add to what I then wrote. My view is that there is and will be no “LibDem surge”, but what there might be is a LibDem gain from the decline of both of the other main System parties, as well as an electoral benefit arising from the Brexit Party surge —if it happens— in the South of England, mainly, where the LibDems are not infrequently in 2nd or close 3rd place.
If the Conservative Party is hit badly in the South, its voters split between Con and BP, the main beneficiary is likely to be not the Brexit Party, and not Labour (in most cases) but the LibDems. In those circumstances (and “Change UK” having died shortly after birth), it is not now impossible to imagine the LibDems again having a bloc of 50 MPs, something that I admit I thought, until very recently, would be impossible. The LibDems may not deserve it, but might in any event get it. In fact, thinking of —inter alia— Boris Johnson, that might just be the epitaph of our present age.
Notes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Swinson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ed_Davey
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Democrats_(UK)#General_elections
Update, 12 December 2022
We now know that there was the 2019 General Election only 5 months after I wrote the above assessment. At that election, my initial judgment, rather than my later speculation, was vindicated: the LibDem vote increased from 7.4% to 11.55%, but the FPTP system resulted in the LibDems losing 1 MP. That MP was Jo Swinson, who exited political life, having led her party for less than 5 months (144 days).
After the departure of Jo Swinson, Ed Davey was elected leader.
The LibDems had 12 MPs after the 2017 General Election, which reduced to 11 after the 2019 General Election. However, since then the LibDems have had three by-election successes, taking their number to 14.
Ian Robert Millard 
The Liberal Democrat Party probably chose Jo Swinson instead of Ed Davey because she is less clearly implicated in that coalition and also because she is Scottish so they may well be thinking she is better placed to win back that small but important cluster of seats her party has traditionally won in Scotland ie in the Highlands which they lost to the SNP.
As for your theory that the Lib Democrats could have demanded PR from the Tories I have my doubts. Sadly, for this country the Conservatives are manic and unhinged extremists on this topic and the level of their sheer fanaticism is beyond all common sense. They are so pig-headed and arrogant they believe they have the innate god-given right to have a crooked electoral system effectively give them sole power in the country on an increasingly lower nationwide share of the vote.
Also, there is the problem of the Lib Democrats own view of electoral reform. If you take a look at their manifestos over the years you will soon discover they are very wedded to one very specific form of PR called the Single Transferable Vote (STV) rather than PR in more general terms. The Tories cleverly and cunningly took advantage of this fact in that they proposed to give the Lib Democrats a referendum to change to the NON-PR SINGLE MEMBER (ie one MP per seat) version of STV called the Alternative Vote (AV). The Lib Dem’s naively thought they would get the country to vote for this PREFERENTIAL electoral system then a few years later they would then press for it to be upgraded to the MULTI-MEMBER PR version called STV. Sadly, the Lib Dem’s fell for this Tory trap on account of their own views of PR and didn’t recognise that this country as that referendum showed has an innate suspicion of ranked ballot/preferential voting systems. Electoral reform, if it happens, tends to occur in a ‘big bang’ moment (this is the experience across the world) rather than be something that is done gradually.
Also, having just one hung parliament situation wasn’t a particularly good platform for the Lib Dems to demand PR. They would have been in a stronger position to demand it if the 2015 election had produced a second hung parliament in a row. The best platform of all though isn’t a hung parliament but a situation whereby one of the major parties has more votes in the country but has fewer seats than its major opponent so it loses the election. This happened TWICE in a row in New Zealand back in the late 1970’s/early 1980’s and it was this crazy situation that finally persuaded their politicians that FPTP is one of the most archaic, profoundly undemocratic and just plain crap electoral systems so it had to be dumped and changed to PR.
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Thank you. I still think that, in 2010, the LibDems could have, at least, demanded a *referendum* on proportional representation. The AV ref. was too little and the referendum was “managed” by Scameron and the msm to produce a No result. The later Scottish one nearly went the “wrong” way, but arrogant Scameron still thought that he could hold another fixed referendum….the EU Referendum. He miscalculated.
In terms of the Con Coalition, the LibDems just did not have the firepower to stand up to the main partner party. Little people were, unexpectedly, given rank, as well as some power and money— and it went to their heads. Danny Alexander is the obvious example but there were others, not least Clegg himself.
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The Lib Dem’s did have an influence in the coalition and rightly so since that is one of the reasons for it having been formed but it was also correct that the Tories were the leading partner since they won many more votes than the Lib Dem’s did in 2010. Proportionality of power is an important factor to consider when forming coalition governments and, of course, these considerations more naturally come about if you have a PR electoral system underpinning them than the FPTP system that is just not suited to forming them.
P.S. The Lib Dem’s could have demanded a referendum on PR but it wouldn’t have done them any good because the Tories truely are completely fanatical extremists on this subject and their MPs are basically totally undemocratic and wholly self-serving arseholes on PR. I’m sadly not joking when I say they are unhinged re PR and they almost have steam coming out of their ears and heads and ready to blow their tops and go red in the face at the mere mention of even having a REFERENDUM on PR!
The Tories even tried, under the Wicked Witch of the West ie May, to REMOVE PR from the London Assembly by a Sri Laken MP’s Private Members Bill despite the fact PR has been used since the inception of the London Assembly and implicitly voted for by the people of London in the referendum that set it up in 1998! The sheer arrogance of the Tories knows no reasonable limit!
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Yes, Cameron had a huge level of arrogance about him and just couldn’t conceive of any circumstances in which we would vote to leave the EU. He didn’t recognise the fact his government’s austerity policies made some people in the North of England in particular treat the referendum as a opportunity to hit back at this and use it as a potent protest vote.
In general, I am opposed to referendums because too many people don’t directly address themselves to the actual question on the ballot paper although I do understand why people do this since we have a completely unrepresentative electoral system so this increases the desire of some to hit out at the political Establishment using whatever means they can.
Due to the wholly unrepresentative nature of our ‘democracy’ we are now lumbered with a Class A prick and utterly moronic oaf called Alexander De Boris Pfeffel Johnson who is ALREADY using ghastly Americanisms like dude. Can’t Boris do Britain a favour and suffer a fatal heart attack? Unlike the geriatric and senile dementia suffering morons of the Con Party no one with the remotest level of IQ wants this goon embarrassing our country and no doubt harming it (a war with Iran soon anyone?)
Jeremy Hunt should leave the Conservative Party. Intelligent and fairly competent people like him are wasted in it. Best to leave it to The CLOWN brigade!
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The Tories are not only fanatical anti-democratic extremists when it comes to the subject of Proportional Representation but also abject HYPOCRITES as you would expect the ‘nasty party’ and self-proclaimed ‘natural party of government’ to be ie they DON’T and NEVER have had a problem with taking-up their seats in the Scottish Parliament where the vast majority (at least until the 2016 election) of their MSPs were ONLY elected because of the regional PR list! IF they were consistent in their fanatically anti-PR views they would just take the seats elected by the FPTP part of the hybrid Additional Member System of PR Holyrood uses and this would have been especially the case in 1999 and 2003 when the Tories only won ANY real number of seats due to the PR element.
To be frank though, I am not sure why the Tories are so utterly petrified of PR because if it were introduced nationally (especially if it wasn’t the STV version the Lib Dem’s favour) then it is probably the Labour Party that would lose out more rather than them.
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The times they are a’changin’ and I daresay that when the Conservative Party falls below 100 or maybe 150 seats, which is possible in the short to medium term, proportional representation will suddenly be found to have merit…
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I think the days when the Liberal Democrat’s could quite easily poll up to 25% of the national vote as the Liberal /SDP did in the 1980’s are probably over for good but I can see them getting around 15% or so. Even under a PR system they would struggle to obtain much more than that. Even Germany’s Free Democrats Party which is their equivalent of our Lib Dem’s has never got more than I think 15% and it is one of the world’s most successful liberal parties.
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On their own merits, i.e. in terms of a positive vote *for* the LibDems, you may well be right to say that the LibDems have had their day as a party polling (in real elections) above 15% or so. However, that is not the whole story here.
Under the FPTP system, most voters do not get the MP or indeed the party for which they vote. Governments are “elected” on a minority of votes. The Conservatives (standing alone) last got more then 50% of the popular vote in 1841 (Robert Peel as PM)! Just over 50% in 1886 and 1900 as Conservative and Unionist. The “National Government” coalition of Stanley Baldwin in 1931 got 55%. Anthony Eden and the Conservative and National Liberal alliance got 49.7% in 1955.
Theresa May’s 42.3% in 2017 was in fact the *highest* Con popular vote since Margaret Thatcher in 1983 (42.4%), and the only time since 1992 that the Con Party scored above 37%.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservative_Party_(UK)#UK_general_elections
As for Labour, it has *never* scored over 50% of the popular vote, not even in 1945 (47.7%); its highest was in 1951 (48.8%). Tony Blair’s best was in 1997 (43.2%). Looked at purely in terms of popular vote, Corbyn’s 40% in 2017 looks good. His and Labour’s problem is that that is largely a “ghetto” vote, locked into ever-fewer constituencies, as we have discussed previously.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Party_(UK)#UK_General_Elections
LibDems: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Party_(UK)#UK_General_Elections
Look at Paddy Ashdown’s results: 17.8% in 1992, giving 20 MPs, but 16.8% in 1997, giving 46 MPs! The electoral system is totally mad.
ps: my point is that people now vote *against* rather than “for” a party. The LibDems may only get 10% “positive” vote percentage, but would also get many votes by voters voting *against* Con or Lab or Brexit Party. That is why (when combined with the splitting off of votes from Con, mainly, by reason of Brexit Party) I could now just about see the LibDems polling at 20% and winning at least a few dozen seats.
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Yes, the Liberal Democrats have always performed the role of the dustbin vote party of British politics with people using them not to positively vote for them and their policies but to use as a vehicle of protest against Labour and Tory. Their true core belief vote is about 7-9% of the electorate as we have seen in recent years so when they do get 20% or more of the national vote it will be comprised of many protest voters.
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Trump is already praising the election of his fellow goon! Yeah, those of us with any brains know the REAL reason why this is and that is because he has good reason to believe the gormless, thick, mongrel floppy-haired idiot in No 10 will allow him to take advantage of us just as that other idiotic showman Winston Churchill enabled Roosevelt to do.
God almighty, do we EVER in this country learn from history? Boris-Idiot is already giving this British patriot nightmares! Boris is so much of a moron he could bring about the end of the United Kingdom just as half-Yank Winston ended the Empire. This is an extreme national emergency so Tory MPs for god’s sake do something soon to bring about the fall of the cretin.
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SOMEONE has to do SOMETHING to rid the country of Boris-Idiot. This is not about Brexit, important though that is. I myself still strongly favour Leave, though the Theresa May excuse-for-a-government criminally mishandled it (possibly deliberately). However, this goes even beyond Brexit. We are talking about a clown and joke, a public entertainer rather than politician (still less “statesman”) posing as PM.
If there are any MPs left in the Westminster monkeyhouse who have any real sense of time and place, let alone public spirit, they MUST combine to bring down the Boris-idiot government. This is impossible but it has happened. I had thought that the Conservative MPs themselves would block him. Their failure has led to this. The whole Conservative Party at Westminster must bear the blame and shame of having this clown imposed upon us. The voters must now vote any way but Conservative whenever they can.
Brecht, and before his derivative rubbish, Marx, noted that history was first tragedy then farce. Roosevelt and Churchill were in many respects evil, certainly wrongheaded, but to compare them to Trump and Boris-Idiot is to compare titans to dwarves. In fact, the temporary “eminence” of Trump and Boris-idiot says a lot about the whole existential problem that the West now has.
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I favour the principle of Brexit too though I am afraid of how the ever stupid Tories might use it ie yet more insane economic globalism, stupid ‘free trade’ deals loaded against Britain, and an increase in non-EU immigration rather than more suitable immigrants. Why do the globalist Tories always twist a potentially sensible and good idea and turn it on it’s head and ruin it?
Hopefully, Boris-Moron Idiots reign will be a very short one and he won’t have to be assassinated like the ONLY PM in British history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spencer_Perceval It looks like our predictions about the by-election in Radnor and Radnor were a bit off beam and the Lib Dem’s will walk it:
https://leftfootforward.org/2019/07/polling-shows-lib-dem-lead-in-brecon-by-election/
Let us hope there is more of that as The Clown needs to be completely boxed-in so he can’t move an inch.
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My blog prediction was a LibDEm win, Brexit Party second, Con third, Labour last (except for UKIP and Monster Raving Loony). The betting odds now reverse the Con and Brexit Party positions in my prediction. I suppose you mean that the LibDems are almost insanely in the lead? They are where Brexit Party was at Peterborough right up to polling day, and we know what happened there…It could yet be closer than we imagine between LibDem and Brexit Party, though I always said that the election was the LibDems’ to lose.
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Please, residents of that lovely (I’ve been there) Welsh town of Brecon do your duty and give the GROTESQUELY irresponsible Conservative (and supposedly Unionist Party) a kicking in the ballots they will never forget.
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You may be surprised (I have been), but my blog post about the Brecon by-election has already, after a month, had about 500 views, well above average for the time it has been up.
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Yes, that was your prediction and it was mine as well. I think the Lib Dem’s will still win as the seat is one of the few that is relatively naturally inclined towards them, they are in second place, had the MP till 2015 etc so there are quite a few factors in their favour. I am wondering if the Lib Dem candidate will get a further boost from Tories disgusted that the party has seen fit to impose Boris-Moron-Idiot upon the nation?
I will be a bit surprised if the Tories don’t fall behind the Brexit Party into third place but it could be close between them. To be frank, I am getting a bit confused as to which party is which between those two and that may be one reason the Tories will come second!
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I think that any Brecon Con voters disgusted by Boris-idiot will go to Brexit Party rather than LibDem, but we shall see. As you say, there was a LibDem MP there until a few years ago. It was a LibDem/Con swing seat. The sort of rural, Celtic Fringe, Nonconformist seat which the LibDems once almost monopolized.
What may save the Con candidate from utter ignominy is that his sin was only partly dishonest, partly a question of incompetent bad judgment! He seems to be fairly well regarded locally by some (farmers etc) though others despised him even before his conviction (I read). Hard to say, but he has no real chance of winning, imo. 3rd place or maybe 2nd. I still incline to 3rd.
If Brexit Party lose badly, i.e. come 3rd or 4th, then their balloon will deflate further. If on the other hand, they come at least 2nd, preventing a Con win (or even 2nd), then they have made their point: they have the fate of the Conservative Party in their hands.
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Some Tories will move to the Brexit Party but I don’t see why they would unless they are these single-issue Brexit obsessed bores but then these people are already provided for by the parent party and even more so now. No. I am talking about the few Tories who are serious and thoughtful and are disgusted (as anyone with a brain should be) now the Conservative Party has turned itself into what can only be described as a complete JOKE party with a capital J and imposed a goon and class A moron on the country as PM.
It is hard to think we are talking about the party of Robert Peel, Robert Gascogne-Cecil, Arthur Balfour, Stanley Baldwin, Neville Chamberlain, Alec Douglas-Home all of them serious, thoughtful and dignified men and then this Yankee born,half-Turkish/partly Jewish, unkempt mongrel monkey from London Zoo’s chimp playpen turns up.
Still, they did have Iain Dunce-Smith as leader for a while (although wisely they never allowed him to fight any general election) so the degeneration has been going on for quite a while now.
With a bit of luck this repellent electoral victory today will cause the final death of the Conservative Party.
Alexander Boris De Pfeffel Johnson – YOU ARE NOT MY PM!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leader_of_the_the_Conservative_Party_(UK)
Those previous leaders of a once serious party must be spinning in their graves today because of the Orange Orangatan’s victory.
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I should imagine that the serious old-style Conservative MPs (I think that there are a few left) must be rotating well before their personal demise.
The main System parties are changing and have changed since, say, 1989. The “Conservatives” as a party are now those 140,000 or so mainly elderly people who (at least 2/3 of them, as the vote has made clear) think that a part-Jew, part-Levantine Muslim public entertainer can be Prime Minister. I don’t think that, in his hear, even the clown himself really thinks that. For him, this is a kind of large-scale Oxford Union election. He has won and is now “king of the world”.
Did you see him speaking at the ceremony today? Reminded me of the old-style Jew bookmakers in Tattersalls or the Silver Ring at somewhere like Windsor evening race meetings c.1972.
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Speaking personally, I don’t regard the Conservative and Unionist Party as of today as in anyway a serious party and from now on I am mentally filing them alongside the Official Monster Raving Loony Party.
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Like many institutions in the UK, the Conservative Party has been living off its hump, or its past history, for a long time now.
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God only knows what deadheads will be filling the cabinet of the Man-Child.
Boris’s Cabinet meet around the Cabinet table for the first time: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPD_m2IalTc
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I approved the comment but the video is “unavailable”, apparently.
As to the Cabinet of Boris-idiot, I await with fascinated horror. Can it really be true that Liz Truss and Nadine Dorries will make Cabinet? Esther McVey to stay? Priti Patel? Despite her acting as an agent of Israel?
This “government” must be removed as quickly as possible.
The one bright point is that this will probably be the end of the Conservative Party as a heavyweight party of government. I see that Farage is offering an electoral pact, presumably Cons not standing in certain seats Brexit Party think should be theirs. I cannot see any Conservative leader acceding to that. National parties usually contest all seats, even the most hopeless, as a matter of form. The problem for the Cons is that the Conservatives cannot get close to a majority if Brexit Party contests all seats (as they will and have the means to do) and if Brexit Party then gets even 15% nationwide.
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Watching The Clown assemble a cabinet will be an utterly surreal experience and in contrast viewing The Exorcist would be a heck of a lot less frightening!
He HAS TO GO! This is a full scale national emergency!
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I noticed this:
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It seems as if we will never have an ethnic Briton as Home Secretary ever again!🤬 The dangerous clown has appointed Priti Patel to be Home Secretary. I’m sure she will do a fantastic job controlling Britain’s extremely leaky borders – NOT! Nice to know cretinous Johnson thinks having an proven agent of a foreign sovereign state that isn’t especially friendly towards this country ie Israel (PM Menachim Begin sold Exocet missles to Argentina during the Falklands’ War) is ok to be in charge of MI5.
Why can’t the unelected prick have a massive heart attack or stroke and become the first PM to die in NO.10 since Henry Campbell-Bannerman?
I don’t like the Liberal Democrat’s but I hope they and the Brexit Party give the treasonous Tories an absolute walloping in Brecon and Radnor. I want to see a plus 30% swing against this grotesquely irresponsible party.
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Yes. Boris Idiot is trying to weaponize Brexit for himself and so the surely now obviously misnamed Conservatives. He has no room to manouevre when his Commons majority is now only 3 and may soon be 2 or 1 even with DUP support. His answer may be to engineer an election in October. He thinks that he can bamboozle the voters into voting Con. Much depends on whether Farage is really willing to oppose the Cons or will roll over in return for Brexit promises.
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Yes, the moronic half-Turkish/half-Jewish clown has already shown massive misjudgement by appointing Priti Patel -the Israeli Agent- to be Home Secretary thus gaining TWO PC Brownie points in one appointment!
Really, why doesn’t this utterly vile globalist foreign-born incompetent twat go and die? Very few people in this country want him apart from geriatric Tories with senile dementia.
This country could do with an early Christmas present!
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That will become apparent once a general election is called. The EU elections were not so indicative, but the Peterborough by-election was.The Conservatives were left with their core vote, not much above 20% in that seat. That is why what Brexit Party does is crucial.
If Farage does not fully oppose the Cons, Boris-idiot might *not* flop now that the Labour vote struggles to get above 30% nationwide. I could even just about see Boris agreeing not to put up candidates in some seats, thus gifting Farage maybe 20-50 seats. That would be unprecedented for a major System party. In return, Farage would lay off in say 300+ Conservative seats.
If Brexit Party fails to stand nationwide, and stands only in 50 seats where the Cons have agreed not to stand, then it might score anything up to 50 seats (which otherwise might go Con) but Con Party gets a clear run in 600 seats and might end up with 300 or 350. Con 350 + Brexit Party 50 = 400 and a huge majority in the Commons…
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The official Tory Party theme tune for the next general election which is no doubt coming very soon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJ9yAV8uQ7g
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Re: That article in the Irish Times, I have had a look at many articles in foreign newspapers and other overseas media sources and I can’t think of a SINGLE ONE that has anything good to say about this self-serving charlatan. Also, foreign politicians, except the original Tango Ad in Washington DC, are universally dismissive about his abilities or suitability to be Britain’s PM.
Just how many torturous days do we have to put-up with him for? I’m getting impatient for the end of his very ill-deserved tenure already!
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I was struck by the TV coverage. The Sky News reporter was actually asking some “expert” whether there would be a no-confidence vote the day after the Commons returns from recess (I believe that would be 4 September)! The expert/talking head thought that possible!
Look at the appointments! This may already be the most despised Cabinet ever!
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Simply put, we are: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxqvwkmTNy8 with this half-Turkish self-serving arsehole in power.
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No, I didn’t watch him speaking at the ceremony today. I have no wish to see horror/circus freak shows that early in the morning surprisingly enough! I think rather than a larger scale version of an Oxford Union election he thinks being PM and a. Tory Party leadership election is more like a version of the Eton College Wall Game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWXXI6uRBQM
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I think it is high time someone set-up a new single-issue party (seeing as they are all the rage at the moment) called The Let’s permanently close Eton College down party seeing as the record of that public school in providing decent PMs to this country hasn’t been a good one for many years now and the latest ‘product’ will no doubt prove to be the biggest Eton Mess yet!
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Yes, I know she is Jewish but I do have a bit of a soft spot for Nigella (she is, after all, the hostess with the mostess) A woman who can cook is a good find too!
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“Video unavailable”.
ps, we *do* part company on this issue (Nigella Lawson)…
pps she is, I think, half-Jewish only.
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In principle I disagree (believing in educational freedom), but I have to admit that so far (aged 62) I have not met a single Old Etonian who is not an idiot, a poseur, a freeloader or a pretentious know-nothing.
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Regret delayed reply. There was a tremendous thunderstorm lasting 20 mins (so far). Hail not rain. I have never heard or seen hail so powerful. I thought that windows would be broken. The hail was so huge and dense that it looked like a snowstorm, and it set off the security lights outside. The ground completely white. Rather un-English weather.
As to the Eton Wall Game, its principal aspect (to the public at least) is that it is rarely actually won or lost.
“Famous past players of the Wall Game include Boris Johnson, who was Keeper of the College Wall”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eton_wall_game
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I also believe in educational freedom in principle and think people should be able to use their own money in their own way provided it doesn’t harm others and if those choices extend to paying for a son or daughter’s education at a private school then so be it. Also, there is a wider philosophical point to be made regarding private schools in that it is good that at least some schools are not directly under the control of the state as allowing the state to have total control over schools can be a good basis for a very authoritarian society or even a possible dictatorship.
So, let’s keep all the ancient and major public schools and other more minor private ones open apart from Eton College as its record in providing decent PMs in modern times is truely diabolical and I see no reason why that record is going to change anytime soon! Just a shame Charterhouse couldn’t have provided a second PM overall and one within the last one hundred odd years this week! I say give the other major public schools a chance!
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The school I last attended has, I think, at least in the last 60 years, only provided 1 MP and he is an Indian! (Alok Sharma MP).
https://www.rbcs.org.uk/
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Off topic – i had to chuckle at this rather “hysterical” article concerning a few Nationalist stickers displayed! https://www.mynewsmag.co.uk/racist-hatred-in-abbots-langley/
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Even on the premise that the UK is now half-mad (at least half-mad), it is extraordinary that the Hertfordshire Police think that those (completely true) three little posters constitute a “hate crime”.
BTW, I saw this and thought of you…I think not so far from your home zone:
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/gran-41-drank-10-pints-18652719
What I find extraordinary is that here you have a vulnerable victim attacked by this obviously drunken couple and their teenage son; the victim was on life support; still suffering; egregiously violent and unprovoked attack (on a misidentified victim); cctv evidence overwhelming too. Sentence: 1 year for the mother, which was lenient (esp. when you look at her previous convictions); non-custodial sentences for husband and son— absurdly lenient.
Even the Mirror calls it “a brawl” when in fact it was an unprovoked and serious attack on someone unknown to the defs; he was just looking for his dog.
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A truely disgusting and repellent crime and yet another sign of this country’s ( or, as it so plainly is under the Tories a mere business park) increasingly steep descent into absolute lawlessness and degeneracy.
It’s time we got truely tough on these criminal scumbags and seriously considered reintroducing judicial corporal punishment at least for young men (though how we deal with the ever-worsening yobbish behaviour of young women I have no idea) and then see how that deals with the situation ie whether it reduces some violent offences and improves overall discipline in society before we reintroduce capital punishment for some of the worst crimes.
The Tories think combatting people who have non-PC opinions is more important than punishing people who violently attack vulnerable people. This is A SERIOUSlLY SICK party with entirely the wrong sort of priorities.
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Would it be wrong to use corporal punishment on young women who behave as badly as young men (in some cases), that is *when* they do?
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The Daily Mirror is overflowing with daily reports of some sick criminal acts being committed. You might think this would prompt at least a few of its normally Labour-voting readers to step back a moment and think whether they should back Labour as that party isn’t the party of law and order (mind you, the Tories aren’t either nowdays) and to start to look, at other parties to deal with the problem. After all, violent crimes and indeed other forms of it too very often afflict working-class communities more than wealthier areas.
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That was the genius of Blairism, to package globalist capitalism as “socialist” by offering (and to be fair, up to a point delivering) the masses “law and order”, some social improvements (hospitals, schools, libraries etc) though at the cost of PFI, social inequality, alien influx and other evils.
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Ha, these private schools let in virtually everyone these days! I see that standards are dropping in the private educational sector as well as the state sector as the British population gets ever more dumbed down by mass, uncontrolled immigration. Well, if even the supposedly most prestigious public school in the land, Eton College, allowed The Clown to attend then it would have been unfair for that Indian immigrant to have been turned away from your old school!
According to Wikipedia, Jeremy Kyle went to it as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reading_Blue_Coat_School
Standards! Who needs them?
In my local town, our private school, Brentwood School, counts amongst its most notable alumni Jack Straw, Noel Edmonds and someone who they probably don’t mention to parents of prospective pupils David Irving!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brentwood_School,_Essex
I see that the great Enoch Powell (I bet the more sensible elements within the Conservative Party wished they had a candidate for leader like him to choose now instead of Boris-Moron-Idiot) attended King Edward’s School, Birmingham:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Edward%27s_School,_Birmingham
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enoch_Powell
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Yes, Hull is not far from me – north of the river Humber, i am south of it. As for the article itself, it is typical of the drunken violence that is not “uncommon” in areas like this unfortunately! It also highlights the disproportionate emphasis the authorities place on individuals displaying moderate, yet accurate nationalist material, whilst minimizing serious violence – such as the one featured in the piece!
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Yes, this is what the authorities do and the disparity of treatment is becoming increasingly severe. The police don’t give a damm about violent crime and often other crimes too, have become ludicrously politicised and THEN they wonder why so many ordinary people resent them, don’t trust them and have no wish to help them. Seeing as the effective combatting of crimes relies upon an efficient police force being helped often by law-abiding members of the community the increasing incidence of crimes should come as no surprise.
It’s high time the police were set free from the Marxist cult of PC but that will never happen under the loony-left CONServative Party.
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With respect to using corporal punishment on women, perhaps you are correct as some of them are just as thuggish as too many young men are but I still tend to recoil from believing we should do that. With women and their bodies being less strong than men’s they might not be able to take the punishment safely (not that some of them don’t fully deserve a good thrashing).
It is noteworthy that the authorities in Singapore who, of course, are pretty infamous for their readiness to use harsh punishments don’t use the rattan cane on women:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Singapore
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Well, as you know, I am generally opposed to both capital and corporal punishment, but a lawless culture is developing, has been developing for decades. I imagine that it would be a huge deterrent even if only ONE stroke or lash were delivered, so long as it were both very painful and known to be so. The public would also then see that drunken or other violence is disapproved of in a serious way. At present, the courts are just not doing their job in this regard.
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I think the rattan cane as used in Singapore would be a deterrent to some people more than the birch was. A rattan cane flogging a la Singapore IS painful and is DESIGNED to be. Flogging people in this way may even be more of a deterrent than hanging. It seems as if every country that still has judicial corporal punishment also executes people but there is none that only flogs.
Yes, let’s use a rattan cane and see how it goes for a few years then we may not need to use capital punishment. This could be a good compromise between people who wish to see more stringent punishments and more effective deterrents for criminals and others who would be reticent about supporting the return of the hangman’s noose.
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Perhaps, we could use up to three strokes of the rattan can on women?
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Perhaps. The UK “Overton Window” would not accept the merciless lashings which occur in backward societies such as Saudi Arabia. On the other hand, a symbolic one might be acceptable *for the worst cases of cruelty or brutality*, whether by man or woman. Personally, were I to have to put a maximum number down, I should say that the norm should be 1 and the maximum 6, without discrimination male-female.
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Some crimes I would like the return of the hangman in Britain for would be for high treason and aiding and abetting the genocide of the British people which I consider Tory and Labour immigration policies to constitute. Politicians from both parties should be doing the Tyburn Jig for their policies in this regard. Personally, I would volunteer for the position of hangman in order to carry out some of their executions!
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Ha. I have some sympathy with your view, particularly as the UK now has a basically alien Cabinet:Indians, Pakistanis, part-Jews.
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This situation is utterly deplorable and almost entices me to vote Labour or Lib Dem! At least under the Liberal Democrat’s we would get a non-alien cabinet and a British PM!
The CONServatives and the moronic monkey can go to hell after what they’ve done this week. Boris should be nowhere near No.10. His presence inside that historic building is making it less clean! After what I pray will be a very short tenure it will need a full-scale fumigation to remove his stench! I can only hope those famous pictures of previous PMs on the staircase develop some magic powers and cast a spell upon this wretch.
Where is Dominic Grieve when you need him?
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It’s funny. I do not agree with Grieve on Brexit; however, I praised him in a tweet c.2014, but the stupid Jews (UK Lawyers for Israel, who were the complainants against me) misunderstood my meaning and that tweet (at first) formed part of the case of the Bar Standards Board against me at my Disciplinary Tribunal in 2016! Not that I was praising his politics, but more his behaviour.
Boris-idiot and his crazed cronies seem to think that by weaponizing Brexit, in any upcoming general election the Conservatives will get their core vote, plus all Brexit/Leave supporters, plus various floating voters. I disagree! You and I are examples of Brexit/Leave supporters who detest Boris-idiot and (in my case) do not want the UK to become a multikulti Singapore freeport.
My guess is that not very many voters beyond the core vote (which I put at around 20% nationwide) will vote Conservative in any election soon. If Brexit Party stands, many Leave/Brexit supporters will vote that way (though you and I might not). The new Liberal leader I personally find completely unattractive in every way, but many, esp. Remain supporters, will see her and the LibDems as an unfrightening alternative to either Con or Lab.
I have tried to wargame this via Electoral Calculus, but that cannot be taken as 100% accurate. The only way the Cons can get an actual majority is if they get about 35% or 40% nationwide, if Brexit Party gets no more than about 5%, if Labour gets no more than about 30% and if the LibDems get no more than 15%.
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I really do t know for the life of me what was wrong with Jeremy Hunt as a possible leader? Yes, he voted Remain in the referendum but he recognised the political imperative of getting us out of the EU. It surely couldn’t have been his record as Health Secretary? That surely wouldn’t have made a difference since any voter who has an ultra-concern about that issue would never vote Tory anyway.
I can only think Jeremy’s intelligence and experience frightened and intimidated a lot of Tory members and MPs and they didn’t want a leader who showed them up in that regard. Well, congratulations to these numbskulls as now you have a monkey organ grinder as your leader!
Boris will mess Brexit up so instead of still getting it with Jeremy Hunt albeit at a little bit slower pace there will be either no Brexit at all or a severely bodged form of it and no doubt the loss of Scotland too which Jeremy would have prevented.
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To be frank, I do not think too highly of Jeremy Hunt either, but he was obviously a better candidate for the job, as such. He is in some respects an irritating character, with all the traditional English haut-bourgeois smugness etc, but he had the basics of a statesman (unlike Boris-idiot), is fully English (unlike Boris-idiot), does not make wild and undeliverable promises (unlike Boris-idiot).
When you talk of Boris-idiot, you are not in normal political territory but in the realms of narcissism and con-man politics, the realms of Horatio Bottomley, Robert “Maxwell”, James Goldsmith (though he was a very intelligent man, despite his lack of political nous).
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Yes, Jeremy Hunt wasn’t ideal but compared to London Zoo’s chimp the difference in quality and just basic suitability for the job was massive.
The Tory Party is often called ‘Britain’s stupid party’ so they went for the imbecile. It shouldn’t have been any surprise. We can only hope the electorate punishes them heavily for this utterly crass act of bovine idiocy.
Come on you denizens of Brecon and Radnor!
I read a report on the web from the local newspaper there that Tory signs are being defaced with ‘Bollocks to Boris’ across them! So, it seems as if some will indeed punish the Tories for imposing this goon on the country.
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In this country now, it takes something to shock me on the political stage, but Boris-Idiot has succeeded. Not just having a plain Israeli agent as Home Secretary, a basically immigrant Cabinet etc, but as Chief Whip a man so lacking in basic decency that he applauded a sick man being starved, left without funds, because he was FOUR MINUTES LATE for a pointless “interview” with some DWP penpusher.
Brecon and Radnorshire will be interesting. A week from today. The performance of Brexit Party will be my main interest. If the Conservative would have won or come very close *but for* the BP candidature, well…that will be noted at once in the councils of the Con Party.
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Putting The Clown into No.10 is similar to letting a boisterous and inquisitive child play with some matches near to paper on a hot Summer’s day and expecting nothing harmful will happen. Wilful idiocy of the highest order in other words.
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The situation is absurd: the PM chosen, in effect, by 92,000 elderly people belonging to one wing of one party.
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If only we had a proper Monarchy in this country like the Principality of Liechtenstein has. There the Prince can dismiss ministers, the PM and sack the government if he wants to. Somebody has to save us from the village idiot of Uxbridge and South Ruislip! I earnestly hope Iran starts to behave itself and that Argentina doesn’t take another pot shot at the Falkland Islands. Can you imagine the sheer horror of Boris-Moron-Idiot
organising a war cabinet or as Rory Stewart said giving instructions to our nuclear sub commanders?
The Man Child needs minders to hold his hands at all times such is his danger to the rest of us!
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As far as Iran is concerned, leaving aside the unthinkable prospect of Britain using its Trident submarines — if, that is, they *can* be used without American (read NWO/ZOG) approval— the UK is almost powerless.
The Iranian Navy may be less powerful than the UK’s [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_ships_of_the_Islamic_Republic_of_Iran_Navy ] but then Iran is basically a regional land power, and its army is about 5 times more numerous at least (not the numbers are everything) than ours. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Republic_of_Iran_Army
If Trump intends to launch a war against Iran, then the UK would, as usual now, be only in “poodle” role.
As for Falklands, I doubt that any naval strategist imagines that the UK navy could launch a re-invasion of the 1982 sort now. I blogged about that a while ago. The carrying capacity etc is not there, the carriers apparently await aircraft that are not yet in place etc. Also, the Army, Marines etc are far less powerful now than they were in 1982. Fortunately, a Falklands invasion by Argentina is very unlikely now.
The Boris “government” surely cannot last long. I do not think that it will.
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It certainly is.The idiots who have imposed this buffoon upon the country comprise not even 1% of the entire electorate! It is about 0.25%, isn’t it?
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Well, the Conservative party membership is about (in fact rather more in numbers) where I thought it was: 139,000 voted. c.92,000 voted for Boris-idiot. About 21% of the UK population is under 18 so about 54 million are 18+. That works out at 1 Conservative Party member who voted Boris for every 587 adults in the UK. As you say, about 0.25% of the adult population.
Correction: about 0.175%…
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Back to caning Singapore-style: https://mustsharenews.com/british-drug-trafficker-caning/
Admittedly a bit brutal but still just deserts for criminal scum!
I bet even the degenerate half-Turk we now unfortunately have in No.10 wouldn’t have been as keen to take drugs if he lived in Singapore👌😀😎
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I might make an exception for Boris-idiot and permit the suggested max of 6 strokes to be increased!
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Ha, ha, I sentence Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson to the maximum number of strokes of the rattan cane a court in Singapore can impose ie 24 stokes.😂😀😂😂🤡👌
Or an alternative scenario as a British judge in a 1950’s era style courtroom: (I’ve just put on the black cap on my judge’s wig) so I will now pronounce the sentence: “Alexander Boris De Pfeffel Johnson, you are 55 years of age, it is my duty to pass upon you the only sentence the law can pass for the crime of wilful High Treason, you will be taken from this place to a lawful prison and thence to a place of execution where you will suffer death by hanging and your body buried in the precincts of the prison in which you shall be last confined before execution and may the Lord have mercy upon your soul.” Amen (said by court officials etc) Me as the judge,” Take him down”
😂😎👌😂😜😝😎😂😂😂🤡🤡🤡🤡
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In the words of the 1960s song, “I like it”!
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https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/geoffrey-cox-apology-commons-speech-rent-income-tory-minister-a9020051.html. Not the first time this man has been in trouble over commons rules, most notably claiming for milk and weedkiller and for claiming for a fridge for his office!
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https://www.capitalpunishmentuk.org
https://www.capitalpunishmentuk.org/hanging1.html
https://www.capitalpunishment.org/hanging1.html#modern
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Shall we introduce a modern day version of British history’s infamous ‘Bloody Code’? I realise, of course, that sentencing Alexander Boris De Pfeffel Johnson to a death sentence for being a Class A dickhead may be considered to be a touch harsh by namby-pamby, liberal-left, soft on crime types but we have to have effective deterrents to these types of people lest we have more disturbing pratts as PMs in the future.
Also, perhaps some consideration should be made for the return of public hangings as a hanging of Boris in public could pull in the crowds and make some money for the state in this age of celebrity idiot politicians!
😂😂😂😂😎😎😎😎😎👌👌👌👌👌
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I see society less punitively! While it amuses to think of execution of the egregious and evil, we must always remember that “hard cases make bad law”. Sometimes we must remind ourselves of the wider agenda.
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afterthought: I saw this https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/breaking-man-who-battered-neighbour-18762876 and it occurred to me that some future government might decide to covertly eliminate such untermenschen while they are in prison custody…
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Another day, another horrific case of violent crime! The Daily Mirror should be renamed The Daily Serious Crime Record and just look at the other serious crimes in the side column!
The sentences they were given for this callous and very brutal crime are ridiculously lenient. Why not impose a whole life tariff?Life sentences too often don’t actually mean life! Speaking personally though I would subject these scumbags to capital punishment considering the sheer wickedness of the crime and the fact there were no mitigating circumstances. Also, you have to consider how costly it is for the taxpayer to lock-up people for considerable lengths of time!
A future nationalist government will have to launch a veritable reign of terror on criminals to clear scum like that off the streets!
Perhaps, eugenics has something going for it it with untermenschen like that walking the streets?
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I read the Mirror online mainly for the crime and court reports.
Did you see that 50 young blacks launched a so-called “zombie” attack on an Aldi store today? This is what we face down the line. Something akin to the Third Reich v. the Congo. No prisoners…
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I see that Boris is (at long last) trying to smarten himself up a bit. Nicky Clarke (famous celebrity hairdresser) must be very talented to improve my haircut and make me look slightly less like Worzel Gummidge and
he is good value for money even at £250 a pop:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicky_Clarke
http://www.nickyclarke.com/salons-london-mayfair/#price-list
http://www.nickyclarke.com
More seriously, Britain needs a party like Marine Le Pen’s in France:
https://rassemblementnational.fr
Or Germany’s AFD: http://www.afd.de
The British Tories are far too much of a liberal-left globalist party nowdays.😞
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For me, the FN/RN and AfD are not radical enough. Far from it.
I thought a while ago that Boris-idiot recently trying to look less like a clown was probably the influence of Carrie Symonds. She probably told him to lose some of the hair, lose the paunch, smarten up generally. She is from a public relations background. Not much she could do about his brain, though.
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Both parties being national-Conservatives/nationalists are still far better than anything we have got from the liberal-left globalist anti-British trainwreck that is today’s ‘modern’ Conservative Party to Farage’s obsessive single’-issue libertarian bores of the Brexit ‘party’
Presumbably, the NPD is more to your liking then?
https//npd.de
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Yes. I agree. Of course, in Germany, “democratic” political and party activity is quite closely controlled.It is becoming that way here too. Blair’s 1997 law setting up the Electoral Commission is key. That, as Martin Bell said, was “profoundly undemocratic”…
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https://npd.de
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No, I didn’t see that report about those young blacks launching a so-called zombie attack on an Aldi Store.
It doesn’t surprise me in the least that these sort of crimes are now occurring. Our evil, anti-British politicians would call it one of the benefits of our ‘enriched, vibrant, multi-cultural society!
It is strange that those same politicians wouldn’t dream to actually live in these areas!
I sadly agree with your future prediction. Didn’t Adolf use capital punishment rather extensively? Well, just like Benito Mussolini had the saving grace of making Italian trains run on time, Uncle Adolf at least had some strong law and order policies!😎😀😆😂
These young black bucks who do these sort of crimes undoubtedly need dealing with!
Normally, I prefer the very British and therefore very civilised method of long-drop hanging to deal with the worst criminal scum but I am wondering whether we should instead use the method of the old American South:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Stinney
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https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/9586929/zombie-gang-storm-aldi-supermarket-birmingham/
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/zombie-mob-goes-rampage-aldi-18775163
Note that, even with the cctv evidence, neither newspaper is brave or honest enough to call them “rampaging blacks”; oh no! They are “teens” or “youngsters”! “YOUNGSTERS”?! The language of the 1940s, pressed into service of 2019 political correctness!
What about this? https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/woman-walks-naked-through-london-18777746
Monkeyworld.
Mussolini is regarded as a posturing clown in England, but in fact he did a huge amount of good in Italy: eliminated the Mafia (but the Americans released them all in 1943!…Lucky Luciano insisted…), large amount of new building, town planning and regeneration of slum areas, education, science, industry in the North etc.
As for Hitler, most of what he did was positive, a fortiori before 1940. Crime was greatly lessened not only because of stiffer penalties but because the incubation zones for it were largely removed: the Jewish vice trade in Berlin especially, the poor housing, lack of decent employment, general decadence of the Weimar period. And so on.
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I agree that Benito was an effective and fairly benevolent dictator of Italy who improved life in Italy to some considerable extent. This is why many Italians of today are not ashamed of his rule eg I went on holiday to Lake Garda/Lake Como a few years ago and you will see souvenirs of Mussolini openly on sale around there. I must admit I was a bit shocked at first.
Quite a few Italians also make pilgrimages to the town of Predappio where Benito Mussolini is buried:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predappio
and his granddaughter is an MEP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandra_Mussolini
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I think that Sophia Loren is related to Mussolini.
Actually, until wartime necessities made it expedient to demonize Mussolini in public, Churchill was well-disposed toward him and, until mid 1940, wanted Italy either to join with Britain against Germany or (more realistically) to declare neutrality (like Spain and Portugal).
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Or, as in places like South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama,Mississippi we could introduce mass lynchings for these troublesome, criminally-inclined young black bucks or as Boris Johnson would so eloquently put it these, “piccanninnies with watermelon smiles”.😂😂😂😝😝😝😝😂😂😂😂
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I do not think that I would go that far, even had I the power.
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You are going soft, Iain! It simply won’t do!😀😂😀😝
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Give me the power and let’s see! Or as the trial judge sings in Trial by Jury, “Gentlemen, she says that when in drink, he hits her and kicks her. Gentlemen, let’s make him tipsy….and see!”
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