How is the Tory Government Doing?

I love the Daily Star front pages

Norpig wrote:I love the Daily Star front pages

They're done as a party.

There should be death row for the Conservative Party.

Nobody could defend many of the actions of the Tory government nor a number of its MPs but come on, are you seriously suggesting that a Corbyn government would have been better? Can you even imagine the cock up he’d have made of the virus, let alone Ukraine and now Gaza!! Hammer the Tory’s as much as you like but if you believe Labour would have been any better you’re kidding yourselves and if you even think that much of the party has changed under Starmer you’re also kidding yourselves. As I’ve said many times, even a bad Tory government is preferable to any Labour one. Sadly I suspect you’ll find out after the next GE and if it does lead to the destruction of the Tory party, which I very much doubt it will, only be a good thing to cleanse us of the idiots in there now.

Whitesince63 wrote:Nobody could defend many of the actions of the Tory government nor a number of its MPs but come on, are you seriously suggesting that a Corbyn government would have been better? Can you even imagine the cock up he’d have made of the virus, let alone Ukraine and now Gaza!! Hammer the Tory’s as much as you like but if you believe Labour would have been any better you’re kidding yourselves and if you even think that much of the party has changed under Starmer you’re also kidding yourselves. As I’ve said many times, even a bad Tory government is preferable to any Labour one. Sadly I suspect you’ll find out after the next GE and if it does lead to the destruction of the Tory party, which I very much doubt it will, only be a good thing to cleanse us of the idiots in there now.

If that's all you've got, it's pitiful.

Yeah because BoJo and Truss were great weren't they? Sunak has no mandate and is just as bad.

Starmer isn't pulling up any trees but he will do a much better job than the self serving pricks we have in now.

Whitesince63 wrote:Nobody could defend many of the actions of the Tory government nor a number of its MPs but come on, are you seriously suggesting that a Corbyn government would have been better? Can you even imagine the cock up he’d have made of the virus, let alone Ukraine and now Gaza!! Hammer the Tory’s as much as you like but if you believe Labour would have been any better you’re kidding yourselves and if you even think that much of the party has changed under Starmer you’re also kidding yourselves. As I’ve said many times, even a bad Tory government is preferable to any Labour one. Sadly I suspect you’ll find out after the next GE and if it does lead to the destruction of the Tory party, which I very much doubt it will, only be a good thing to cleanse us of the idiots in there now.

If all you've got is "imagine if"....

....nobody can say if Corbyn would have been better or worse, but the one thing Corbyn would have done is prioritised the people at a time when the people needed prioritising.
One thing he wouldn't have done is hand out massive contracts to incompetent cronies.

I'm no fan of Corbyn, but on balance I think he'd have handled the Covid crisis far better than Boris....

....especially as we're now hearing the true extent of his clusterfuck government.

He’d have just printed more and more and more money. There’s no question about that.

At least Corbyn is a man of principle (even if the principles are misguided!)....whereas the Tories under Johnson were/are unashamed liars and corrupt, self-serving criminals who show no compassion or understanding towards others.

They will be out at the next GE that’s for sure. With all this shitting on normal folk they have done etc they have cemented their fate and good riddance!!!

Perhaps you all missed my first comment that “ nobody can defend many of the actions of the Tory government nor a number of its MP’s.” Or maybe you just ignore anything that doesn’t fit your own one eyed agendas? If you generally are serious that you believe a metropolitan, antisemitic Pygmy like Corbyn could ever have dealt credibly with major issues then there’s no point even conversing with you. This government has been a shambles and a disgrace but it’s only that that could possibly make the current Labour Party seem anything remotely like a credible government in waiting.

okocha wrote:At least Corbyn is a man of principle (even if the principles are misguided!)....whereas the Tories under Johnson were/are unashamed liars and corrupt, self-serving criminals who show no compassion or understanding towards others.

Oh dear Oko, you poor misguided soul. I could laugh at that but I genuinely think that you’re trying to be serious. 🥱

wanderlust wrote:
If all you've got is "imagine if"....

....nobody can say if Corbyn would have been better or worse, but the one thing Corbyn would have done is prioritised the people at a time when the people needed prioritising.
One thing he wouldn't have done is hand out massive contracts to incompetent cronies.

I'm no fan of Corbyn, but on balance I think he'd have handled the Covid crisis far better than Boris....

....especially as we're now hearing the true extent of his clusterfuck government.

Well considering it wasn't the Tory government that awarded the contracts and it was the Civil Servants that did - to the companies that had access to the Chinese manufacturers that produced over 90% of the world's PPE's, - then I would imagine that under whatever government there was at the time, the contracts would still have been awarded to exactly the same companies.

And although I've mentioned it a few times in the past no one on here seems to grasp that the people who own companies and are entrepreneurial tend to be natural conservative voters - for example which high profile businessmen or women are well known Labour supporters for instance?

So it is only natural that those owning the companies that had access to the Chinese PPE manufacturers were overwhelmingly Tory supporters and I dare say some even Tory donors.

The Conservative party is basically funded by rich business men, whilst the Labour Party is funded by the Trade Unions.

My point being is that there is nothing actually odd or unusual in that the owners of businesses with access to the Chinese PPE manufacturers (or any sort of Chinese manufacturer in particular) would be companies whose owners are Tory thinking in their politics and most probably well known in their local communities and rub shoulders with their local MP's irrespective if these MP's were Tory or Labour - so when the call was made for 'help' (at a time when the Tory Party had a 80 seat majority) that most of the help (probably 100% of it) could only have come from companies owned mainly by Tory supporters, who passed on their offers to help to their local MP's - who were by far mostly Tory MP's anyway!

You, and millions of others, have simply bought in to the spin of the likes of Maugham about cronyism and corruption over the awarding of contracts that simply never was there at all.

You, Maugham and millions of others just simply wanted it to be so.

And that's why you and the rest of them can't understand why no corruption and cronyism has ever been found - it hasn't been found because it never happened - it was just spin that you and everyone else swallowed.

You simply never checked the facts - and didn't believe them when I told you at the time.

And clearly don't believe me still...

Wasting your time Sluffy. Everything Tory bad, everything Labour good. If it wasn’t so tragic it would be funny. Obviously every decision made over the last 13 years has been a Tory decision so it’s probably only to be patently obvious that they get all the criticism. Sadly this Labour lot will be an even bigger disaster for this country as Labour always is but I suppose the public need to have it proved to them by experiencing it. The political pool of MPs on all sides is so utterly lamentable at the moment that it hardly makes a difference who gets in as they’ll all be dreadful. The political landscape genuinely needs a complete change to more closely reflect the views of the population which we won’t get under the current system and with the numpties infecting it just now.

Whitesince63 wrote:Wasting your time Sluffy. Everything Tory bad, everything Labour good. If it wasn’t so tragic it would be funny. Obviously every decision made over the last 13 years has been a Tory decision so it’s probably only to be patently obvious that they get all the criticism. Sadly this Labour lot will be an even bigger disaster for this country as Labour always is but I suppose the public need to have it proved to them by experiencing it. The political pool of MPs on all sides is so utterly lamentable at the moment that it hardly makes a difference who gets in as they’ll all be dreadful. The political landscape genuinely needs a complete change to more closely reflect the views of the population which we won’t get under the current system and with the numpties infecting it just now.

And which system would more closely reflect the views of the population? Do tell.

boltonbonce wrote:
And which system would more closely reflect the views of the population? Do tell.

I think you already know the answer to that Bonce. UKIP represented a huge proportion as did the Brexit Party yet under the current system neither were represented proportionately in Parliament. I’ve always previously been against PR but now I believe it’s the only system that will properly reflect the views of the majority. 

Labour no longer speak for the working man and haven’t since the 70’s and the Conservatives are further away from supporting business, entrepreneurs and a low tax economy than they’ve ever been. In fact there’s arguably little or no difference between the pair of them and the Lib Dem’s are as always irrelevant. We need a change.

Whitesince63 wrote:

boltonbonce wrote:
And which system would more closely reflect the views of the population? Do tell.

I think you already know the answer to that Bonce. UKIP represented a huge proportion as did the Brexit Party yet under the current system neither were represented proportionately in Parliament. I’ve always previously been against PR but now I believe it’s the only system that will properly reflect the views of the majority. 

Labour no longer speak for the working man and haven’t since the 70’s and the Conservatives are further away from supporting business, entrepreneurs and a low tax economy than they’ve ever been. In fact there’s arguably little or no difference between the pair of them and the Lib Dem’s are as always irrelevant. We need a change.

In very simplistic terms 'politics' - read that as 'power' in this case - is a closed circuit cycle - with just two elements - political parties influence the voters - and the voters vote for the party they've been most influenced by.

Politicians, or rather the political strategists behind them are extremely good at influencing and manipulating - I repeat 'extremely good'.

People on the whole are easily influenced and don't like to change their ways - that's why in this country some seats remain Labour or Conservative for generations after generations.

People stick to their 'own kind' - we have two clear examples on here with Wanderlust who lives on social media following everyone who hates the Tories and W63 who although he's smart enough to know his party has been poor in their behaviour (and they have), he's still been brainwashed over the years not only to dismiss Labour out of hand (and under Corbyn he was correct), but also to believe implicitly in the adopted Libertarian (right wing) extremist polices that gave us Truss' 'mini budget'...

We are what we are, the country has been 'influenced' by social media, 'Main Stream Media has been replaced by the likes of GB News - think of it as the equivalent to Americas Fox News - both spouting extreme right wing ideology to the masses.

Politics have moved to the extremes globally - and we are (or have been) following that trend.

Seems to me the utter contemptuous behaviour of Johnson and Truss administrations have severely damaged the Conservative chances of re-election but it isn't a given the Labour will achieve an outright majority either - will the SNP vote collapse perhaps, or not, will the Lib Dems form some sort of alliance with Labour perhaps - personally I don't see either happening at this stage but theirs still a year to go to the General Election.

Whatever happens we've got to understand that the people casting their votes are susceptible to what they are fed and believe in from social media where many particularly the generations from regular Facebook users and younger live their lives being manipulated from their 'feeds' and who they follow.

That's the real world we live in and NOT the one we think we do.

Sluffy wrote:

Well considering it wasn't the Tory government that awarded the contracts and it was the Civil Servants that did - to the companies that had access to the Chinese manufacturers that produced over 90% of the world's PPE's, - then I would imagine that under whatever government there was at the time, the contracts would still have been awarded to exactly the same companies.

And although I've mentioned it a few times in the past no one on here seems to grasp that the people who own companies and are entrepreneurial tend to be natural conservative voters - for example which high profile businessmen or women are well known Labour supporters for instance?

So it is only natural that those owning the companies that had access to the Chinese PPE manufacturers were overwhelmingly Tory supporters and I dare say some even Tory donors.

The Conservative party is basically funded by rich business men, whilst the Labour Party is funded by the Trade Unions.

My point being is that there is nothing actually odd or unusual in that the owners of businesses with access to the Chinese PPE manufacturers (or any sort of Chinese manufacturer in particular) would be companies whose owners are Tory thinking in their politics and most probably well known in their local communities and rub shoulders with their local MP's irrespective if these MP's were Tory or Labour - so when the call was made for 'help' (at a time when the Tory Party had a 80 seat majority) that most of the help (probably 100% of it) could only have come from companies owned mainly by Tory supporters, who passed on their offers to help to their local MP's - who were by far mostly Tory MP's anyway!

You, and millions of others, have simply bought in to the spin of the likes of Maugham about cronyism and corruption over the awarding of contracts that simply never was there at all.

You, Maugham and millions of others just simply wanted it to be so.

And that's why you and the rest of them can't understand why no corruption and cronyism has ever been found - it hasn't been found because it never  happened - it was just spin that you and everyone else swallowed.

You simply never checked the facts - and didn't believe them when I told you at the time.

And clearly don't believe me still...

You keep flogging this dead horse - with no regard to the fast-track "VIP lane" emergency legislation that resulted in companies connected to the Tory party being 10 times more likely to be awarded with a contract e.g. Feldman recommending Gummer (Tory peer Lord Chadlington's SG Holdings) who were given £50m of contracts and numerous others.
Now I know full well who was the awarding body of the contracts - I am questioning the probity of the decision-making process within the awarding body and specifically civil servants' vulnerability to external influences.
Perhaps you might like to consider the facts of who actually received the contracts? Maybe the DHSC were influenced by former Tory Chair Feldman working with them in an "advisory role" during this time? - or maybe it was merely a coincidence that the awarding body's "advisor" made the "recommendations" and the contracts just happened to go to companies wherein people connected to the Tory party had a vested interest?
However having experienced the process of the award of government contracts first hand - and spent a considerable amount of time being one of the aforementioned "external influences" myself (albeit not having as much clout as a former Chair of the Tory party ) I don't believe for one second that it is a coincidence.
But that's my opinion and of course Chadlington, Feldman and the DHSC rigorously denied any misdemeanour in the handling any of the 51 companies they put in the VIP lane when questioned in the enquiry - but it's impossible to prove either way so the record shows it's just a series of huge coincidences.
As it stands, the PAC report concluded that
* DHSC had "significant failings" in their procurement process especially failure to undertake due diligence
* DHSC remains in dispute with a large number of the suppliers they appointed
* DHSC themselves believe that they were defrauded in some cases
* Tax payer facing a bill of £billions

Theoretically, it could be coincidence who received the awards and that the DHSC were merely incompetent rather than complicit - but it doesn't change my opinion though and I understand the purpose of this forum is to express opinions.

You are of course entitled to your opinion and your knowledge of how the government works through your experience in a NON GOVERNMENT ORGANISATION (it still cracks me up that!) but I rather go with the facts.

1 - The National Audit Office forensically scrutinised the system of the awarding of the PPE contracts and found NO evidence of abuse of the system in awarding the contracts.

Investigation into the management of PPE contracts

https://www.nao.org.uk/reports/investigation-into-the-management-of-ppe-contracts/

2- The Judicial Review Court.

Judicial review is a process under which a government's executive, legislative, or administrative actions are subject to review by the judiciary.  In a judicial review, a court may invalidate laws, acts, or governmental actions that are incompatible with a higher authority. For example, an executive decision may be invalidated for being unlawful, or a statute may be invalidated for violating the terms of a constitution. Judicial review is one of the checks and balances in the separation of powers—the power of the judiciary to supervise the legislative and executive branches when the latter exceed their authority.

Judgment: Good Law Project’s PPE contracts challenges

Following a five-day hearing in May 2021, O’Farrell J found almost entirely in the Defendant’s [THE GOVERNMENT'S] favour. In brief summary, she held:

i. The Secretary of State was obliged to comply with the principles of equal treatment, notwithstanding the applicability of Regulation 32(2)(c). While the ‘open source’ approach he had adopted generally was compliant, the operation of the High Priority Lane itself was not: offers that were introduced through ‘Senior Referrers’ received earlier consideration at the outset of the process, thereby increasing their chances of securing a contract.

ii. Prior to the issue of proceedings, the Secretary of State had complied with his duty to give clear and sufficient reasons for awarding the contracts under challenge.

iii. None of the award decisions was irrational: the Secretary of State had not placed any reliance on their referral to the High Priority Lane when awarding the contracts to PestFix and Ayanda, and sufficient technical and financial verification had been carried out.

iv. The Claimants had sufficient interest to bring the claims.

v. Relief (in this case, a declaration of unlawfulness) in respect of the breach of the obligation of equal treatment was nevertheless REFUSED under s.31(2A) of the Senior Courts Act 1981, on the basis it is highly likely that the outcome would not be substantially different. Given the high volumes of supply on offer, the contracts would still have been awarded.

Aside from the political and media interest in the Government’s Covid-related procurement activities more generally, the decision is likely to be of considerable importance for public lawyers and procurement practitioners in future:

i. As well as clarifying the requirements of equal treatment and transparency which apply under Regulation 32(2)(c), O’Farrell J’s lengthy discussion and authoritative restatement of these principles more generally is likely to be of wider significance for any challenge based on breach of these retained EU procurement principles.

ii. The judgment emphasises the high bar for any rationality challenge: the Claimants’ [Good Law Project] rationality ground failed in its entirety, with the judge noting that in the circumstances “the court’s role is not to second-guess an appropriate calculation of the risks involved or substitute its own assessment as to the propriety of the contracts awarded“. Even where there was evidence that errors had been made in technical assurance process, it was “not appropriate for the court to scrutinise every aspect of it in minute detail or substitute its own decision.” Those acting for Defendants may well refer these dicta as well as to the summary of the law on rationality in future challenges.

iii. The case is also an important reminder of the power of s.31(2A) SCA 1981, in particular for ‘public interest’ claimants who are seeking only declaratory relief.

iv. Finally, the ancillary ruling on confidentiality (following an application by the Claimants which was supported by submissions from the Press Association) is likely to be of ongoing significance whenever the Court is required to balance the interests of open justice with the confidentiality of commercially sensitive information in procurement proceedings.

https://www.monckton.com/judgment-good-law-projects-ppe-contracts-challenges/

3 - Parliaments Public Accounts Committee

The Committee of Public Accounts is a select committee of the British House of Commons. It is responsible for overseeing government expenditures, and to ensure they are effective and honest. The committee is seen as a crucial mechanism for ensuring transparency and accountability in government financial operations, having been described by Professor the Lord Hennessy as "the queen of the select committees...[which] by its very existence exert[s] a cleansing effect in all government departments"

Inquiry COVID-19: Government procurement and supply of personal protective equipment

Interviewed -

David Williams,
Second Permanent Secretary at Department of Health and Social Care

Jonathan Marron
Director General, PPE at Department of Health and Social Care

Michael Brodie
Interim Chief Executive at Public Health England

Alex Chisholm
Permanent Secretary at Cabinet Office

Gareth Rhys Williams
Government Chief Commercial Officer at Cabinet Office

These are the top Civil Servants who were personally responsible for the signing off the PPE Awards contracts - and as one of them said during his interview, it was HIS head on the block if anything was found wrong in the awarding of the PPE Contracts!

The report can be found here.
https://committees.parliament.uk/work/6612/management-of-ppe-contracts/publications/

So if the INDEPENDANT forensic auditors of the government, the Law Lords and Parliaments top scrutiny committee can find NOTHING illegal, dodgy or corrupt in the awarding of the contracts and NOTHING has ever been found by countless numbers of investigative journalists in THREE YEARS, nor as ANY whistle blower, ripped off business partner, or vengeful wife, etc, have come forward to 'spill the beans', then I can confidently state that NO corruption, cronyism or any form of illegality occurred in respect of the awarding of the PPE contracts AND fwiw Maugham has basically been knocked out of the park with the Judges, Judicial Review decision that REFUSED to award him a RELIEF (in simple terms he won in name only - on a very minor technicality (which the judge in their findings has stated will not be entertained as being significant enough to bring any future  similar claims against) - but it would NOT have changed anything in the awarding of the contracts which would have happened exactly the same irrespective of this technicality - the judge in effect refused to award him (GLP) costs that would have set them back over a million or more!

Oh and btw...

Tory peer cleared for second time of breaking lobbying rules over PPE contracts

Watchdog says there is insufficient evidence Lord Chadlington breached rules over £50m in contracts

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/sep/27/tory-peer-cleared-breaking-lobbying-rules-ppe-contracts-lord-chadlington

And as W63 says correctly and what I've said about you many times in the past...

Whitesince63 wrote:Wasting your time Sluffy. Everything Tory bad, everything Labour good.

You've simply swallowed the spin of the likes of Maugham because it fits in with your hatred of the Tory Party and everything it ever does.

Well, well,well...




After 3 years and a stream of constant, repeated and emphatic denials of any involvement whatsoever, an authorised spokesperson for the pair of them has said that they both were involved with PPE Medpro.
What's more the government were fully aware of the situation all along and sat on it's hands and did nothing to contradict their denials.
Now why would that be?
Well done to the likes of Led by Donkeys, Good Law Project, David Conn etc