I'm not entirely sure why we bother, but it seems GE 2024 ('25?) has kicked off with Starmer's "6 first steps". Just for completeness:
- Deliver economic stability: empty. Only on the list - at the top - as some kind of pro forma finger-crossing anti-Truss-style-meltdown incantation.
- Cut NHS waiting times: they all say that, and always have done. Doubtless some number-juggling possibilities, otherwise it can't in practice be delivered by anything short of vast sums of money a la Blair government.
- Launch a new Border Security Command: empty. A trivial opportunity to give highly paid jobs to a handful of ex coppers etc. Will impress nobody, & certainly not the people-smugglers.
- Set up Great British Energy: empty. Is any Green even vaguely satisfied by this as a commitment to anything they really care about? Whatever happened to "the climate emergency is the #1 top priority for all of mankind, trumping all others" etc etc?
- Crack down on antisocial behaviour: empty. Can't be delivered.
- Recruit 6,500 new teachers: empty. There are 567,000 teachers in the UK. Assuming an average career of 25 years, that means approx 20,000 are recruited annually in any case. Tweak those assumptions as you like, but 6,500 is still an empty number.
Aside, then, from #1 (purely for the finance sector) the rest are empty words corresponding to polling data on popular priorities. NHS > immigration > climate > ASB > education.
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Anyhow, as literally everyone has spotted, Starmer has cheerfully reneged on everything he's ever said. His entire strategy rests on "looking the part" = sober white man in suit. (POCs in suits, clearly in vogue recently, don't really seem to have made much of a mark in any part of the UK, though I suppose Khan would beg to differ and he may have a point.) Starmer's reverse-ferret word-gaming is shameless enough to impress any spin doctor anywhere, and as a complete aside, I noticed a really cute one last week. One of his biggest faux-pas of recent times came last October when he very deliberately said Israel had the right to cut off food, water and electricity to Gaza. Last week he had this played back to him and he "welcomed" the opportunity to remind everyone that he'd immediately corrected the misunderstanding that he could ;possibly have meant what he said: he had of course meant the right to self defence, as he'd immediately made clear.
Except, we know that wasn't what happened. In fact, for several days afterwards, his people were instructed to hit the airwaves with highly equivocal explanations of what he'd said that didn't in any way represent an immediate and clear correction: and well to the fore in this sophistry was Emily Thornberry. And it was she, last week, who popped up with more of the same, because she now has a clever argument that he was right all along! It goes like this: he was speaking only a couple of days after 7 Oct. Israel had just commenced anti-Hamas operations, and as a purely temporary tactical military expedient, cutting off electricity etc to your enemy is perfectly OK. So what he said was OK, too!
Amazing. How long will these people get any benefit of the doubt whatsoever in government? The Left hates them deeply: the Greens soon will; and you can see why.
ND