How is the Tory government doing?

Hardly relevant when the only alternative was Jeremy Corbyn!

The public trusts Boris Johnson more than Jeremy Corbyn

An Opinion poll published over the weekend found that less than a quarter of the public thinks Corbyn is “trustworthy”- a lower share than Johnson – and 36 per cent find him principled, the same as the prime minister.

It’s quite an achievement. Johnson, after all, drafted an article backing Remain days before coming out for Leave. His venality and lust for power are infamous.

Corbyn’s ratings on every other front are terrible. Only 16 per cent of people think he is “best to negotiate with the EU” – fewer than one in six. Less than a fifth think he is a strong leader and able to get things done. Only one in five say he “represents what most people think” – quite the failing for a man who is meant to stand for the people Westminster forgot.

This is an extraordinary disintegration for someone whose reputation is built on honesty and principle – “straight talking, honest politics” – fighting someone known for his lack of either.

Having taken so long – via so much public flip-flopping – to commit to a second referendum, the party has pulled off the unenviable achievement of sounding like a pro-Remain party to Leave voters, while coming across as pro-Brexit to angry Remainers. When people don’t trust the leader, they’ll fill in the blanks for themselves.


And so it turned out to be - no one trusts Johnson but they all trusted Corbyn even less!!!

Labour have only themselves to blame and that's why Johnson is the PM with an 80 seat majority.

Simple as that really.

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/jeremy-corbyn-boris-johnson-brexit-labour-party-a9026511.html

T.R.O.Y. wrote:Yes I’m well aware of Williamson’s history thanks, always come across as a weasel to me (like Liz Truss or Nicky Morgan) no values of his own, will swing whichever way will keep him in power - just my impression of course.

Not sure why any of that means he isn’t part of policy making though. Essentially he leads and managers the civil servants at his disposal - are you suggesting Johnson is so incompetent he’d ignore the guidance of the department headed by Williamson and go his own way?

Not saying your wrong - just seems like a massive pivot for you to be arguing this angle.

Not sure what you mean by 'massive pivot'?

Government departments do not make policy decisions on the hoof.  They will be led by the political aims of the government in power who they 'serve'.

A number of 'key' politicians will form part of a 'kitchen cabinet' so to speak along with other key power brokers and advisors, some not even being in Parliament and they will formulate policy and direction but I doubt very much Williamson is part of that group of people.

I don't suppose A level results were even an issue (seems Scotland, Wales and NI were doing the same sort of 'calculations' in lieu of there being no exams) until the shit hit the fan in Scotland.

I would have imagined the the DOE civil servants would have come up with some form of various scenarios/options that could be considered for England, one of the options being what Scotland did, namely bin the changes and simply accept mocks and teachers assessments but I very much doubt Williamson chose to stick by his guns without running it past number 10 first.

Clearly having been told what was what was required, he strenuously denied there would be a U-turn.

Obviously there was!

If it was his decision then his position would be untenable within the party for being responsible for the shambles and he would have no option but to resign.

The fact he hasn't - nor even been called into number 10, or even have Boris make an appearance suggests to me at least was that he was just following orders from above.

Unless I'm mistaken - and I've not followed this to closely as it is of no interest to me personally - I've not seem anybody trying to pin the blame on him personally and demand his resignation but rather people know that the real blame lays higher than Williamsons level and have rightly laid the blame on the government (or in other words Boris and his clique at the top).

I would imagine in normal times the opposition would have the knives out to obtain a resignation and the government would probably sacrifice Williamson too but that doesn't seem to be happening because I think we all probably know Williamson in this case was only the puppet and the real real ones pulling the strings are inside number 10.

It's all ultimately pointless though on a political level because this won't bring down the government and they have a 80 seat majority to block anything at all meaningful that can be done in Parliament.

Do people still think it was worth it to have had the Corbyn 'experiment' of a completely unrealistic socialist dream world that hardly anyone outside the Corbynistas actually believed in?

As the saying goes we get what we deserve and that could mean another nine years of Boris and his mates!

Given the current situation I actually think policy was made ‘on the hoof’ in this instance. Little choice in the matter, nobody could plan for this and decisions had to be taken quickly.

Personally I doubt the DofE will have been excluded from that conversation - think they (with Williamson being their lead) will have played a large role. But as I said that’s just my opinion of course - your view is perfectly plausible that Cummings and Johnson are behind all the decision making (plenty believe that).

On the ‘massive pivot’ comment - Normally you argue to defend the government though, and against social media theories (Cummings running their government). So I’m just surprised is all.

It seems that under this government you never have to resign no matter how big a mess you have made as long as you are loyal to Boris.

wanderlust wrote:
Ok then. When Brexit starts to become a reality next year the country will go to shit, prices will rise, key materials and medicines will suffer shortages and the government will blame covid.

Still waiting for Nat's reply to this.

Some of us on this site have been warning you how bad brexit is going to be for some time now.

T.R.O.Y. wrote:Given the current situation I actually think policy was made ‘on the hoof’ in this instance. Little choice in the matter, nobody could plan for this and decisions had to be taken quickly.

Personally I doubt the DofE will have been excluded from that conversation - think they (with Williamson being their lead) will have played a large role. But as I said that’s just my opinion of course - your view is perfectly plausible that Cummings and Johnson are behind all the decision making (plenty believe that).

On the ‘massive pivot’ comment - Normally you argue to defend the government though, and against social media theories (Cummings running their government). So I’m just surprised is all.

The policy clearly couldn't have been made on the hoof because someone had to come up with the algorithms and apply them to all the A level students in the first place - exactly the same was being done by the respect Scottish, Welsh and NI authorities well BEFORE a the problem was even known about.

DOE would not have taken such a policy in isolation.

The question would be what decision making was done AFTER the shit hit the fan in Scotland.

There appears to be three obvious alternatives - stick with what was done with no appeals, stick with what was done with appeals, scrap it like Scotland did.

The DOE wouldn't have made what in effect is a political decision and neither would Williamson without referring it upwards.

Clearly the answer he got was that the appeals process was 'robust' enough to resolve things and he took that stance.

Clearly the scale of the problem swamped the system a few days later forcing the U-turn and again the DOE or Williamson would NOT have done a government U-turn without seeking out what the government wanted them to do.

So I would completely rule out decisions being made on the hoof at DOE/Williamson level.

I don't believe Johnson and Cummings take sole policy decision making themselves, there are undoubtable many more analysists, advisors, key politicians, others with vested interests, that feed in and have a greater or lesser voice in things but the decision would have been made at that higher level and not in a meeting chaired by Williamson at the DOE.

As for the positions I take, I do so on what I either professionally know or have had personal experience in - my career was as a company secretary and I had thirty years experience in the public service many at a senior level.

I don't claim to know all the answers and I don't doubt things have changed somewhat since my time but I'm pretty confident about what I say still about company law (thus what I said at the time about Anderson and more recently about Wigan) and how public sector works (it is a different beast to that of how the private sector functions).

As you know I don't normally 'do' twitter and thus am not influenced one way or another by the 'gossip' and crowd reaction to it.

No doubt I do miss some golden nuggets of information but I also avoid 99.99% of the uninformed and often factually incorrect shite that is spouted on there.

I am happy to read stuff on social media about stuff that interests me at the time - for instance the 'Howard' thread on ww at the time of the take over was worth it to listen to the professional knowledge and insights of Howard, Escobarp, Benny and Custard but there was a great deal of shite and uncalled for abuse to suffer through too.

I regularly read Iles (although he clearly now is not seen as a friend of the club by the current and previous owners) but he is the focal point for many and he gets a lead every now and again, given to him.

I read Nixon when he is relevant to Bolton, or recently Wigan and he usually is much better informed than Iles although you have to take into account that Nixon job is to sell stuff to national papers so not everything he posts is, shall we say, totally relevant.

As someone myself posting on social media - which of course Nuts is - I don't expect to be believed or even trusted in what I say - which is only fair as apart from one or two (custard for instance on accountancy or Escobarp on M&A) I do the same.

I post really to help and inform and because I enjoy doing so, I also have the time to do it.  I don't do so to be abused or trolled although I am aware as that is seen part and parcel of normal social media behaviour.

I know it irritates many people with my style and lengths of postings (particularly those who view on their phones only) but if anyone is interested to really want to know why things are how they are you need someone with knowledge to explain so and I simply can't provide detail in 120 characters and a couple of emoticons.

People can simply take me or leave me, I don't mind which, it is only meaningless chatter on the internet when all said and done and helps me to happily pass my time away.

The basis of the problem lies in the fact that, at the time, Boris' only concern was to pick an all-Brexit-supporting cabinet to "get Brexit done".....one that would back him through thick and thin.

Unfortunately, this meant that very few of these very grateful cabinet members had expertise in running a department, let alone one which demanded personal experience. Little surprise then when they messed things up as world events and priorities changed. 

Johnson evidently felt that Cummings' presence and ideas were necessary, but he has proved controversial and unreliable....a liability in many ways. He is not as bright as he and Boris think. Public opinion and trust have suffered.

My real beef with this shower is that they won't accept blame, try to wriggle out of responsibility, don't really care about the non-privileged, parrot the party script, try to cover up, lie, deny, and are essentially hard-hearted.

okocha wrote:The basis of the problem lies in the fact that, at the time, Boris' only concern was to pick an all-Brexit-supporting cabinet to "get Brexit done".....one that would back him through thick and thin.

Oh give it a rest, after years of stalemate it would have been foolish to pack his cabinet with Remainers.

xmiles wrote:

Still waiting for Nat's reply to this.

Some of us on this site have been warning you how bad brexit is going to be for some time now.

I'd also like to point out i predicted this Prime Minister supported by a cabinet selected on loyalty would be shambolic/incompetent.

The only 'policy' they were elected on was 'get brexit done' - been pretty obvious for months now there is little substance behind them.

But i don't deserve credit for that, think a lot of people knew this would be the outcome - shame not enough!

Natasha Whittam wrote:

Oh give it a rest, after years of stalemate it would have been foolish to pack his cabinet with Remainers.

I'll give it a rest when they stop messing up daily! 

A balanced cabinet, "packed" with intelligent, incisive, talented, thoughtful, kind, fair-minded, honest ministers would serve the country better.

i.e. Copy New Zealand....

Essential reading, brilliantly written (Sorry, Nat):

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/14/welcome-to-gavin-williamsons-disasterclass-where-incompetence-is-core-curriculum

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-53847638

The Depatment of Education was warned about the inadequacies of the examinations algorithm back in July. Yet Gavin W claimed he only found out last weekend.....

You’re going to wear this thread out mate, but tbf they really can’t stop providing the cock ups
Got to the point where I’m left wondering what they’ll mismanage next. God knows what will happen when our EU trading agreements expire. Tick tock.....

Dido Harding appointed to one of the most important positions in our response to this virus as head of the National Institute for Health Protection. This is a woman who has presided over an enormous data breach in her role for Talk Talk and then somehow landed a role as head of the NHS test and trace programme (the less said about that disaster the better).

You’d think such an important role would be advertised and the strongest candidate with the strongest record and credentials selected. But no, once again loyalty is the sole requirement to land a role from this shambles government.

T.R.O.Y. wrote:Dido Harding appointed to one of the most important positions in our response to this virus as head of the National Institute for Health Protection. This is a woman who has presided over an enormous data breach in her role for Talk Talk and then somehow landed a role as head of the NHS test and trace programme (the less said about that disaster the better).

You’d think such an important role would be advertised and the strongest candidate with the strongest record and credentials selected. But no, once again loyalty is the sole requirement to land a role from this shambles government.

Boris probably read it as Dildo Hardon and couldn't resist.

London Evening Standard has commented on a leaked Government document which outlines the worst case scenario if a second wave of covid coincides with a no-deal Brexit.Key points:
* Local Government may collapse and troops may be deployed on the streets to quell civil unrest
* Navy deployed to protect fishing waters
* Food airdrops for the Channel Islands
In a way I'm glad that the Government is at least scenario planning even though much of this was envisaged on these very pages.

wanderlust wrote:London Evening Standard has commented on a leaked Government document which outlines the worst case scenario if a second wave of covid coincides with a no-deal Brexit.Key points:
* Local Government may collapse and troops may be deployed on the streets to quell civil unrest
* Navy deployed to protect fishing waters
* Food airdrops for the Channel Islands
In a way I'm glad that the Government is at least scenario planning even though much of this was envisaged on these very pages.

Somebody should have told them to join the forum. We have experts on everything.

'Get Brexit done'

Boris hasnt read an Email since he became PM. He highlights hundreds of them at a time and clicks delete.