Consultant Psychiatrist, Health Professional, fully-qualified doctor, Wes Streeting (actually has a BA in history) says he believes: This "opinion" has nothing to do with his worry that proposed cuts to Personal Independence Payments might be opposed by the few remaining Labour MPs with a conscience. I love the use of "too many people being written off". It's a real piece of new Labour doublespeak, suggesting that some unwilling people go to their doctors for help and that somehow prevents them from being employed. I see all these doctors with their "thou shalt not work" rubber stamps being the guilty parties. I expect they're all woke.

I actually find it sickening that Streeting is trying to swing the narrative that these ill people aren't really ill. Presumably he's consulted widely and done a vast amount of research to form this view. Couldn't just be some crap from a labour/tory spin doctor?

Yeah the "too many people being written off" line is kinda fucking genius honestly. Sound compassionate while slashing benefits.

Unnecessary cleverness, maybe, in this era where the winning strategy seems to be to tell lies so fast that no one can catch up and hold you to account.

It really just feels like Labour's goal is to just tee Reform up for the next election.

Is Reform losing any ground because Trump scaring the bejesus out of just about everybody?

I don't think the kind of people likely to vote Reform would make a connection between them and Trump. And Trump's been quite insulting to Farage which reinforces a separation there.

I forgot about that last part. You'd think they have quite a lot in common, but maybe that's a problem.

Yeah, that Wes Streeting thing about over-diagnosis of mental illness. Turns out he was right all along.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/apr/24/nigel-farage-says-mental-health-cases-hugely-overdiagnosed
 

Hahaha. What has haaaaaaaappppppppened.

Looking forward to my choice between four right-wing parties and the greens next election. Hey, maybe the greens will also be tories by then!

I was a bit cross at myself after posting that - don't want to be over negative and fed up with being a doom-scroller. But what the hell; it's almost word for word. Mind you, since we live in "TOYLAND" nobody else appears to have noticed.

When I was 6 or 7 my dad took me to see Babes in Toyland which sort of sounds like something you didn't oughta google, but is actually quite innocent. Except the Forest of No Return scared the shit out of me.

I'd only heard of Babes in Toyland as a band!

Looking it up, which of the several films of that title do you mean? I think I've seen the Laurel and Hardy one but I assume you don't mean that!

This one. 

And this is the forest scene that nearly made a six-year-old me wet myself.

Hahaha. Yeah that's got that sickly nightmarish quality that a lot of Disney stuff from that era has.

Never watched it, I only remember the super-irritating theme song.

Yeah, I saw that post and indications so far from this round of council elections suggest that you were bang on the money. Council election turnouts are usually low, but considering the political turmoil of today, it's sad to see 70% of the electorate staying at home. I can only assume that the general view is that the vote is unimportant since there's precious little policy difference between the main contenders. 

The Runcorn by-election had a "normal" turnout (for a by-election) of 46% and the SIX VOTE win by Reform is not a shock. As with the council elections, when the turnout is modest, a party with zealous voters has an advantage. Plus, of course, no point in voting Tory here.

Starmer has announced radical plans to address voter indifference and inject some vigour into the national debate, promising hope for the future. This involves doing exactly the same as now, only more so. More austerity, more fuel to the woke wars, more refugees thrown back in the sea, less focus on things that those rough boys won't like.

Yeah I wish people would get it through their heads that Reform are the symptom, not the problem.

It's not Reform who've opened the door to the populist right, it's decades of austerity, stagnant wages, crumbling infrastructure and culture war bullshit from dreary centrists who're more afraid of (mildly) upsetting the markets and donors than of the far right.

And we have a Labour government *doubling the fuck down* on exactly what got us here in the first place (as you've said). Which would be kinda understandable from Tories - they may well be willing to accept a lurch to the right rather than conceding ideological ground - but is fucking baffling from Labour.

Things are obviously shit. Everyone can see that. And the only party acknowledging that is Reform. I think, aside from anything else, people just want to vote for someone who says they'll *do* something. They want some sort of action to combat how shit things have gotten. They want *policy*. It's why Corbyn and Bernie did as well as they did and it's why Reform and Trump are winning.

The political elites are either criminally out of touch or aware of this and making the calculation that they'd rather have the far right than upset the wealthy. And both of those alternatives are fucking terrifying.

The only glimmer of hope is the Greens doing pretty well. They gained a council I believe and even had a decent showing where I live, which is kinda nuts (Reform: 38.8%, Tories: 38.1%, Green: 13.4%, Labour: 9.7%). They'd need to change fairly drastically to become a mass party and the unions would need to defect before they could accomplish anything but... it's a start, maybe.

(edit: I think I dreamt them winning a council)




 

Trump has already pissed off and frightened a lot of people who voted for him (pretty much as anyone with half a fucking brain predicted). There are signs Congress and the courts want to apply the brakes. Maybe not a brilliant model to fawn over.

Sure, but he doesn't need to get elected again. And there's a lesson in the fact that he spooked the living shit out of the markets and ... the sky didn't fall in, the sun still rose. He basically reversed 70 years of US trade policy overnight. If only the left were willing to act so radically.

Trump and Farage are incredibly successful politicians who have captured the popular imagination. To not take lessons from that would be idiotic. Not in terms of policy direction, obviously, but willingness to actually *do* things. And in terms of coming across like an actual human being, having a sense of humour etc.. Greens aside, the leaders of all UK parties are fucking aliens.

 

Either way, it will all end in tears.