Keir Starmer - what a b'stard! Keir Starmer failed to consult watchdog about new role after leaving CPS Exclusive: Labour leader did not contact Acoba about taking up role at top firm in 2014*, it has emerged *It should be noted that after Starmer's departure all DPPs were required to consult with Acoba before taking up any employment - it's such a non-story. FFS, why are the Grauniad sticking the boot in?
Bit of a hatchet job isn't it. Photo isn't great either looks like he's just sat on a spike. Mind you he's not the most photogenic. Someone needs to give him a bacon sandwich, I'm sure that didn;t help Red Ed out much. I'm the first to suggest that Starmer isn't fit to lead Labour, or be PM but if they start personally bashing him now, it'll only help out the lot who are currently in power. Don't understand why the Guardian have done this unless they're switching allegiance.
The Guardian? They switched allegiance pretty quick and joined in the pile-on onto Corbyn! I wouldn't rely too much on the guardian... That Saturday paper of theirs is 3/4 full of 'lifestyle' shyte with £2000 coffee tables and £700 lamps. Women's clothes and makeup at laughable, jaw-dropping prices. Reviews of expensive restaurants. Dating pieces where couples go out for a meal at an expensive luxury restaurant and then write about it afterwards. Articles about super luxury holidays and cruises to exotic places. Cooking recipes with expensive exotic ingredients that you've never heard of. Hardly a mention about normal people. Apart from the occasional Stuart Lee article, there's not too much in the guardian worth reading.
The Government controls nothing, we are in the hands of corporations and criminal gangs in suits now.
Pilling onto Corbyn I could understand. He wasn't mainstream enough to be electable and their plane was to have him replaced with someone who was. Starmer on the other had has it in the bag unless he actually starts to say anything of consequence or the media start pilling in on him
Without wanting to reopen the Corbyn debate, he very nearly was elected! A huge increase in the Labour vote, an enthusiastic and engaged youth with hope for the future, surging party membership etc. If it hadn't been for the sabotage by the entire establishment, including within the Labour Party itself, he might very well have achieved what they dreaded and reached No.10. Ideas like nationalisation of utilities and rail etc look eminently sensible and mainstream to me. Even tbe tories are being forced into it, bit by bit. Did you see the fuss about the film they made called 'the big lie'? It was narrated by alexei sayle and features quite a few Jewish socialists - many of whom have been expelled from the Labour Party by non-jewish people for 'anti-semitism'! I haven't seen the film yet because it is banned banned banned. It has been 'cancelled'. We're not allowed to hear what these Jewish people have to say or see the evidence presented that the onslaught was a manipulation. As the title says - a lie. Corbyn has never uttered a racist word and far less committed any acts. In fact, the very opposite. He has spent his life as a committed anti-racist. He has been ostracised from the Labour Party for saying he thought the campaign against him was 'exaggerated for political reasons'. That is the shocking thing we are not allowed to see. The Guardian showed its true colours joining in with that charade.
Liked because there was definitely a massive campaign by the press, including the centre left, and "the establishment" against Corbyn. The antisemitism issues within the Labour left is less clear imho though. There are definitely examples of out and out antisemitism, especially when anti-capitalism has turned into portraying "Jewish bankers" as the enemy of the left. There are also examples where legitimate pro-Palestinian/anti-Israel debate has wandered into antisemitism. I do agree though that Corbyn himself is not racist at all. I'm not convinced that Corbyn's government would have been an economic success but it's hard to imagine it being any worse than the Tory governments have been over the last few years.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...ontrols-lisa-nandy-keir-starmer-b2365616.html Last September, Lisa Nandy said she wanted to bring in rent controls, which would allow local authorities to limit the rent increases landlords can impose. It already happens in Scotland along with a section 21 'no fault' eviction ban. It already happens in most of Europe. But in England and Wales, landlords are free to increase the rent by whatever takes their fancy. Want rid of a tenant but don't want the hassle of a section 21? Simply triple the rent when renewal time comes. That'll move 'em on. Faced with that situation, Ms Nandy said "doing nothing is not an option". Now she has changed her mind. She proposes to do nothing if elected. The problem you see is that if you don't let landlords run wild then that might actually increase homelessness. Even though it just increased by 21% in London alone last year, it might increase it further. Whereas unregulated and free as a bird rent rises are actually a way of tackling homelessness. Oh yes. Counter-intuitive I know, but there you are. War is peace and all that.
Depressing. They could actually throw this election yet if they carry on like this. They need to make an offer to make people’s lives better and more secure.
The problem with rent controls (without other levers) is that professional landlords rent property to make a profit. Recent changes to legislation make the yield on rental property vs the risk a marginal business now. If the government caps rent to the extent that it's no longer financially viable, those rental properties will come off the market. Whilst in demand areas property prices are stable or rising, these properties will remain empty as assets or investments in the hands of the speculators. We're seeing it already with the changes in taxation & legislation, good landlords are quitting because it's just not worth their while anymore and that's without adding in the caps. The only landlords makign cash are those providign substandard overcrowded housign on the cheap. We need more housing in the places people want to leave, we need to create employment in other areas. We need to regulate the market so that quality, security and safety are acceptable to tennant but also give landlords adequate protection from defaulters, bad tennants and financial loss. we need to make it possible for people to make a return on their investments or else they will not invest. It's not an easy fix, if it was it would be fixed. Chucking "Rent controls" into the discussion without any other changes is not helpful.
Isn't that theoretical argument about what 'might' happen with rent controls, rather blown out of the water by the evidence of what actually happens in Scotland and most of the rest of Europe where they already exist? Nobody's is saying that the landlords can't make their unearned income still. Nobody is denying them their profits. They just want to put a limit on how much profiteering can go on, along with protection against the famous 'no fault' eviction, where you suddenly get thrown out of your family home with only a couple of months notice for no reason beyond that's what the landlord would like.
I have a modest portfolio of 3 properties that I've rented out for about 20 years. I decided to go down this route instead of starting a private pension - mainly because the less I have to do with the crooks in the financial services industry the happier I am. I like to think I'm a good landlord - I get any repairs or maintenance work done immediately its needed, leave my tenants alone and never put the rent up (one of my tenants has been paying the same each month for over 10 years - he's a nice chap with a wife and two kids who always pays on time and doesn't give me any grief, so why would I make life hard for him for a few extra quid?). I'm now reaching the point where I'm going to cash in my chips - I'm constantly carrying out tests to make sure things comply with various new rules (that I'd never do in my own home) the tax rises on rental income and the general hassle and responsibility of being a landlord are getting on my t1ts.
From the other point of view, I was that good tenant in my last place - as I've always been. Our family lived there 14 years and never missed 1 rent or was ever late. In those years, the landlords did almost zero maintenance. I could count the times we had to call then on one hand and then for major stuff like Bath waste pipe leaking through kitchen ceiling - they repaired the pipework and stopped the leak, but left the dirty great hole in the kitchen ceiling as it was for the remainder of the tenancy. Once I asked them to get the gutters cleared out because they were overflowing and rainwater was running down the walls - which of course leads to damp. Another time I called them was because a piece of guttering blew down in a storm. Otherwise they never heard from us. All the small jobs I did myself. The bathroom was unventilated but we kept the mould under control and redecorated (the same colour!) A couple of times in there. I must say sometimes when I see tenants complaining about mould and showing walls thick with it, I think we'll get a cloth and some spray bleach and scrub it! It comes off easy. You just have to keep on top of it and do it regularly. We got a dehumidifier too and that helped a lot. I kept the outside and the back garden beautiful. Treated the place like our own. One bad thing was the carpets. They were light coloured all through and well used when we moved in. 'Worn and slightly soiled in high traffic areas' I think the agents said in their language. Well after 14 years and 3 kids growing up there, they were a lot more worn and soiled. Carpets aren't supposed to last 20 years and especially not cheap ones like that. They were worn out and looked awful no matter how much you cleaned them. It was embarrassing when people came round. Why didn't we complain? Didn't want to upset the landlord. Wanted to stay as quiet as possible. They never came round and inspected - an indignity I've had to endure in the past. Coming round with a clipboard every 6 months and examining all your stuff. I was happy with keeping quiet. They did put the rent up, but not fast. We rented at a keen market rate and by the end we were probably £100pm below the going rate. Over the 14 years, we paid them around £150,000 in rent. But then they decided one day they would like to sell up, so they section 21'd us and we had 2 months to clear off out.
I have lots of sympathy for the situation you found yourself in but, at the same time, I think its reasonable for the landlord to be able to sell his property if he wants to once a tenancy agreement has ended. Personally I'd have given you at least 6 months notice of my intention to sell to give you time to sort yourself out with a new place.
It's very early on in the Scottish experiment yet we're already seeing people circumventing the caps. Europe & elsewhere, maybe it works, but invariably there is a different market there and demand is less intense. I'm not against rent caps as a rule, but without other changes around legislation, taxation etc, on their own they will not solve the issue and may actually make it worse. We're in a situation where rental properties are massively oversubscribed (where people want to live). There's not enough to go round. We can't be making it less attractive for people to provide accomodation, when there isn't enough accomodation in the first place. To reduce rents you need to reduce competition for accomodation and make it more cost effective to provide that accomodation. Doing one without the other will further break the system
I hear you're a racist now Jess Phillips: Labour could investigate any claim of Jess Phillips ‘racism’, suggests shadow minister Bridget Phillipson says party has process to look into headteacher Katharine Birbalsingh’s complaint against frontbench colleague That word "claim" is doing an awful lot of heavy lifting here. Here's the original (now deleted) tweet that started the ball rolling: Phillips's twitter thread following her original reply is here.
I’m no huge labour fan, but can anyone suggest a reason why Jess Phillips is racist here? Completely undermines actual forms of racism which many ethnic minorities undergo
I wrote about this on the Tina Turner thread. I am also confused as to why Phillips is a racist. Is it because Ike is black? I don't know. Yes it is misusing the racism argument and devalues it for everyone else. But as well as being racist, stern headmistress Katie, who is a self-declared tory and spoke at their conference, also claims Phillips is a bully because (deep breath).... You're not allowed to see Ike Turner's image because he was the world's premier celebrity wife beater as seen and vastly exaggerated in that Disney movie. Even she admitted that. By posting Ike's image both Katie Whiplash and @Bwood_Horn are guilty of wife beating by association y'see. In the same way, listening to any of his legendary blues and R&B tracks makes you just about guilty of rape and femicide. You bastad! So, La Phillips posted some Sarky reply like 'oh I see you're a fan of wife beating now. You love ike turner' and allegedly sent her bitchy feminist twitter crew in to be absolutely beastly to Katie. The most interesting thing about it by far is the discovery that Phillips' husband is a cousin of SuperKevin Phillips! Finally I bet I am less of a fan of Labour than you.
Dunno - I'm a big fan of the output of the Arts & Crafts movement but I can easily disassociate the work it produced from (the frankly abhorrent) views, social attitudes and behaviour of the practitioners that ranged from eugenics to paedophilia and incest. Does any one know, the ludicrous, Birbalsingh's school's admissions policy - is it selective in its intake? I do like the fact the she parrots the line that knowing the words to "Jerusalem" (sic) helps build a more cohesive "British" state when the author of the piece, Blake, was, pretty much, anti-everything (he was more an anarchist than a socialist)...
Apparently, there's an investigation going on into an as yet unnamed Labour MP who left the seat up in the toilets. This along with a Shadow Minister who burped without saying pardon has the Tory Central Office smelling blood.
Sir Starmer announces that he'll keep the 2 child benefit cap - that they know very well throws families into horrible poverty. He says "Frankly, the left have to start caring a lot more about growth, about creating wealth, attracting inward investment and kickstarting a spirit of enterprise." So there you are @Moose and other labourites. You need to become more capitalist in your ways. Toughen up a little bit. Trash the environment here and there. Exploit a few people. Harden up that heart.
Clearly anyone who wants to see a left wing government has no choice but to vote Tory at the next election
What is the ******* point of Starmer and the Labour Party. He didn't have to say "no", he could have said "obviously this is a very unfair and cruel policy and although we may not have the funds to revoke this law immediately, it is something we would be looking to do when the economy has a better footing." But he didn't. He said "no", purely so the Express Telegraph and Mail couldn't twist his words. Which, of course, they will anyway. And the stupid thing is, revoking this would please just about all of the people he wants to win over. He's a bit a VVanker, isn't he?
I can understand the caution, even his stand on Brexit. But by doing nothing, other than reflect current Tory policy, he is in real danger of alienating the left as well as make those in the centre wonder why they should vote for a Tory lite government when they can have the real thing if they believe in those policies.
I think it was probably an argument he could have dodged by framing it differently, as GOBE says, but equally we're likely at least a 9-10 months out from an election, so caution from a Labour leader is understandable given the whole 1992 experience, and I really don't see this issue as something that's going stop (m)any people voting Labour anyway if they intend to.
I back him on this policy. Given population growth is a huge driver behind environmental change we should really promote smaller family units. As long as support withdrawal is not backdated and multiple births are exempted removing support for more than 2 kids is I think a rational idea.
