Monday 9th January 2023

[refitman]

Morning all.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Good morefternoon, everybody.

[refitman]

Austerity it is then

[AnatolyKasparov]

Again, is he actually committing himself to anything specific?

[refitman]

Well, they haven't committed to actually helping anyone, so until they do, I'll just assume they aren't going to.

[gilsey]

Rawnsley thinks we'll be able to tell the difference.

At heart, Mr Sunak is a low-tax, small-government, light-regulation Tory. That is his desired direction of travel. His default view about the state is that it should get out of the way. Tellingly, his one thought about addressing the crisis in the NHS is that more health care should be provided by the private sector.

At heart, Sir Keir believes in a large and activist government, with the levels of taxation implied by that, though he prefers to talk about an “agile state” to make it sound more attractive to the wary.

The power of government to do good and give the country strategic purpose is a critical ideological divide between the two men. That contrast is far more important than their superficial similarities. What’s the difference between them? Much bigger than many think.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ng-britain

Not sure where he's found the evidence that Starmer 'believes in a large and activist government'.

[gilsey]

THE TWO AGENDAS

During my long adulthood there has been an under-appreciated change in British politics: whereas left and right used to at least agree upon what the issues were, this is now less true.

Historically, left and right disagreed upon economic issues: nationalization or privatization; capital or labour; fiscal or monetary activism; regulation or deregulation; austerity or not. But for all our differences, we at least agreed that these were the big questions.

This agreement, though, has faded. Whist many of us are still pre-occupied by economic questions - how to raise productivity, decarbonize, democratize the economy and so on - many others are not. Their concerns lie elsewhere: in combatting imagined attacks on freedom whilst ignoring real ones; in identity politics; in talk of "diversitycrats", wokeness or "gender identity ideology"; in what should be taught in schools; or in "stopping the boats."

Part of the story is the spread of poshcuntstalkshit programming. The lack of demand and supply of genuine experts means these are filled with "commentators" whose main talent is being able to turn up to a TV studio at short notice. As these are unable to talk intelligently about complex issues - the stalling of productivity growth, fiscal policy; falling real incomes; the NHS's problems - they resort to the drivel one could hear from thousands of golf club gammons.

Linking this mainly for 'poshcuntstalkshit programming'. Nice one.

[gilsey]

Well, they haven't committed to actually helping anyone, so until they do, I'll just assume they aren't going to.

I'd like to be able to 'like' your post.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Not sure where he's found the evidence that Starmer 'believes in a large and activist government'.

There is an arguable case for some truth in that. if you look at actual concrete proposals rather than just vibes.

[frog222]

Slithy's Oh so cunning plan is 'You can have a pay rise, if you pay for it yourselves' !

[frog222]

" The Prime Minister refused to say whether he used a private GP"

[refitman]

Sooooo.... Streeting's gonna face reselection? Right?

[Willow904]

Hello all. I know I haven't posted lately, mostly because there hasn't been much to say beyond the obvious of how awful current government is.

With Labour finally starting to say a bit more, though, whether for good or ill, there's at least a bit more to talk about.

I've never been especially keen on Wes Streeting but I have to say, whether made up 'on the hoof' or not, finding a way to bring primary care back into the public sector isn't a bad idea. Although GPs have always been private sector, primary care used to be overseen as a whole by the public sector in the form of PCTs. They were replaced, of course, by private sector CCGs by the 2012 health and social care act. Since which the number of partnership GPs has been falling, while the number of salaried GPs has been rising - and these salaried GPs are increasingly working for private companies that are taking over GP surgeries. So it's not so much a question of whether GPs should be employed by the government or themselves, as a question of whether GPs should be employed by the private or the public sector and if that's the case then Streeting may well have the right answer because turning back the clock - and growing partnership numbers back to their previous level - may be very difficult, with younger doctors preferring the better work/life balance of being an employee.

[refitman]

What did Bolsanaro do to his furniture/furnishings?

[AnatolyKasparov]

Nothing from Roger for a few days now, hope everything is OK at his end.