Has any politician from any parliamentary party - I include Reform - spoken so plainly and indeed bluntly in Parliament on the topic of illegal immigration and "asylum" as Shabana Mahmood?
The Tories, in particular, must be wondering why they didn't come up with a package of measures along the lines of hers, several years ago.
If Polanski wants to carve out a metro-bedsit-space on this issue for the Greens, well, he'll find it isn't as big in electoral terms as he imagines.
[Gotta feel a bit sorry for "Your Party": they'd love to be all over this and use it as a recruiting sergeant - but they can't prise their own fingers away from the throats of their comrades long enough to write a press release.]
Let's see how Labour splits when it comes to a vote. Plenty of abstentions, but not so many outright 'noes', I'm guessing. They know what their own constituents are saying: they just hope the matter doesn't get raised in Parliament and polite society.
Both sides claim to be guardians of the British Sense of Fairness. My very early experience as a junior officer in the Army is that what the middle classes think of as 'fair' can be starkly different to what the workers think. You can stub your toe badly on that.
ND
12 comments:
WE will see - but must say I am impressed !!!
Shows up Tories.
Talk is just that, I'll believe it when it actually has some impact.
She has the cover of being female and effnik, quite a lot of middle class white graun reading types tend to only encounter middle class ethnic graun reading types, and extrapolate incorrectly, not realising that quite a lot of ethnics, who aren't middle class, and don't buy the graun, are actually pretty socially conservative.
As for fairness, it is a very relative thing, something politicians can't seem to grasp. Target *functional*, then argue the toss.
According to Richard North's blog, the fine print of the announcement contains a fast track bypass of the headline proposals. It's called the "work and study" route. The net effect, in summary, is that the official statistics will show that everything has changed, but nothing much will actually change.
I think the Muslims running Lord Alli must be delighted with the ascendancy of the “right wing devout Muslim” in the Labour Party. With Starmer already in their control a Home Secretary alongside him and the UK is their oyster…
Sharia Law looms ever closer.
The shift in language is interesting. Why go against standard rhetoric now when it's all going so well (not).
How immigration looks to a middle class rural voter and how it looks to a dump-town voter are doubtless different and Labour look cr*p to both. But so do the Tories and Reform. So some fine words from Mahmood, but will they butter any parsnips? I doubt it, just some talk to hold off critics till after Christmas.
Next week the budget, much useless talk and reshuffling our ISAs, then an amble up to Christmas, glad handing and bonus time. Break up on 19th, off to Tuscany then a slow restart January. By then the lawyers and immigrant support groups will have gathered their firepower and I fully expect long 'studies' and white papers and nothing to come of it at all. But Mahmood's paper holds off the evil day for a bit and because the sky has not fallen in maybe the sinews are slightly stiffened until the court cases.
The immigrant problem and the economy will not go away but January storms will do more good. TBH I would have advised against using Crowborough camp, Milne and Kipling rolling in their graves and making a noise.
"what the middle classes think of as 'fair' can be starkly different to what the workers think." Those of us whose parents encouraged us to mix widely knew that before we left school (he sniffed!).
Mind you, meeting "workers" didn't mean I met the urban working class, who lived bloody miles away. Later I did meet plenty: the Scottish ones were less inclined than the English to drivel on about class distinctions, no chance for the likes of me etc.
I thought I might be biased until an English boss I worked for in the petrochemical biz said much the same thing. In an English factory a worker might bitch about something: if he said "What do you think I should do about it?" the man would reply "That's your job not mine." But at Grangemouth the bloke might reply "I've always thought that a guid way t' dae it wud be such and such." I swelled with pride but he wasn't teasing: it was his repeated experience.
Why are so many of the English working class a shower? Discuss.
@ dustybloke
Even the "independent group of MPs" (formerly known as the social-conservative wing of Your Party) are right-wing devout Muslims
IIRC they are all landlords, and they all voted against VAT on private school fees - hahah! Well of course: who else has the gumption and local prestige to get themselves elected to Parliament in a safe Labour seat?!
The Sultana has no time for any of them, hence, errr, ...
(discordant sound of bitter fraternal strife offstage)
Aren't they all anti-trans-rights too?
I'm never sure that going along with people's delusions is a great strategy. Trans women were once called "female impersonators".
Btw Nils Pratley in the graun on UK energy
https://www.theguardian.com/business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2025/nov/20/industry-cant-wait-any-longer-for-a-fix-to-its-energy-crisis-ministers-should-get-a-move-on
Pro landlord, pro public schools, anti trans - they get my vote!
Anon @ 8:45 / Pratley
NP says the Govt statement is "detail-free" and that's the sum of it. This, from the Govt www:
"... will be funded through reforms to the energy system. The government is reducing costs within the system to free up funding without raising household bills or taxes"
That's just hilarious. The cost of what, pray, are they going to "reduce"? I genuinely want to know, because Net Zero is increasing the cost of everything by serious increments.
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