POLITICS CORNER

[plaques]

Where is the Buffoon? The talk is that he and his mates, Frost included, are plotting the possibility of suspending part of the NI protocol. This will cause chaos in international circles not least in the EU who could take all sorts of retaliatory action that could bring the UK on its knees. Not that the Buffoon would care as long as he could shift the blame onto them. A typical 'not me gov' move.

[Stanley]

He's in hiding Ken. Can you just imagine him spluttering and mangling his words if he was pushed into explaining what the hell is going on.
And yes, I heard that theory about what he and Frost are going to do. I heard a lone voice from the EU as well lamenting the fact that the deadly duo are trying to modify their own plan and he doesn't understand it. One can sympathise with him.
One Tory says that things must be bad here if he's going to Scotland to hide.....

[Tizer]

...the Tories seem to have hung ex Attorney General Cox out to dry. Never mind the money or the absence, using his commons office seems to be a bigger crime!

We can't allow that - next thing is we'll find they've been stealing the pencils!

A long list here - and that's only the consultants. Poor Dean Russell, bottom of the list - must try harder!
`Which MPs have second jobs and how much do they earn?' LINK

[Stanley]

When asked about the time stolen from constituents the stock reply is that if the voters don't like it they can make that clear at the ballot. This is crap. They know full well that the majority of voters aren't even aware that their representative is cheating them.

[PanBiker]

A long list here - and that's only the consultants. Poor Dean Russell, bottom of the list - must try harder!
`Which MPs have second jobs and how much do they earn?' LINK

I think it should be noted that the vast majority on that list are Tories.

Not all MP's have their snouts in the trough.

[Stanley]

Did you note the strange episode of Johnson telling a news conference that we were not a corrupt Parliament when nobody had asked him a question about it? (LINK)

[Stanley]

See THIS BBC report on the MPs who claim rent for a London property while renting out one they already own. Unbelievable.
Once you have sucked the juice out of that one, consider THIS piece by Laura Kuenssberg on the possibility of Article 16 being triggered.
Remember the 'oven ready' deal that was on offer? Is there anything at all that Brexit promised that has actually turned out to be true?
Perhaps that's the biggest piece of 'sleaze' and corrupt politics. The way we were lied to in order to get this lunatic policy passed by a referendum.

[plaques]

I think the American's have already kiboshed any thoughts of cancelling the the agreement the Buffoon had drawn up and signed into international rules. The current thinking is that buffoon and Frost will continue to say that 'the conditions for modification / cancelling have been met' but will do nothing about it, This huffing and puffing will continue until they agree (the UK) to the recent dilution offer that the EU has made over reducing border paperwork, They will then claim victory because of their determined hard line stance. All this is to appease his own hard line Brexiteers and hopefully let him continue as Prime Minister a bit longer.

[Tizer]

Mentioned on the Today programme this morning - a Tory MP who is pressing for a no confidence vote on Johnson's government. About time too!

[Stanley]

Yes but don't we need 40?

[plaques]

See THIS BBC report on the MPs who claim rent for a London property while renting out one they already own. Unbelievable.

Every time a MP stands up in the House of Commons he is address as Honourable Member.... Surely taking advantage of a 'loophole' in the rules where they can pocket tax payers money is far from honourable. They obviously knew that this wasn't what the rules intended but went ahead with it anyway. The Buffoon may be saying that the country is not corrupt but he can hardly say that about members of his own sleaze party.

[Tizer]

Yes but don't we need 40?

It's got to start somewhere!

[Stanley]

Ken, I agree with you. I often have that thought when I listen to them using archaic forms of address which completely ignore the fact that the MPs have exactly the same mix of honesty and dishonesty as the rest of society. You are right, Of course Geoffrey Cox and his ilk know that what they are doing is nut in the spirit of the legislation but they do it anyway because there is a loophole and they are greedy. As to why the loophole isn't closed, I think we can all make a guess at that one. The situation with regard to the selling of honours is even more egregious, they can argue as they like but at the moment £3Million seems to be the going rate for a baronetcy.
(Give John Major his due, apart from sounding more and more sensible as he ages he rejected a peerage.)
Peter, you're right and the sooner the landslide starts the better. Johnson is making us the laughing stock of the world.....

[plaques]

While we are all concentrating on the corruption crap. The sleaze party has quietly moved the effluent bill through parliament confirming they WILL allow crap to be discharged into rivers as they originally intended. This is in spite of the Buffoon's promised U-turn to restrict the crap when the protests were making headlines. It reminds me of the old computer adage 'Rubbish in.. Rubbish out' except in the case of effluent its Crap in... Crap out.

[Stanley]

I didn't realise they had done that Ken. Thanks for telling me. I note that THIS major scheme to protect London from exposure to sewage is still ongoing and will cost over £5billion, meanwhile the rest of us will have to put up with sewage discharges in wet weather because it is the cheapest way of dealing with them and dividends must be preserved.

[Tizer]

In his Saturday article for The Times Matthew Parris likens the Boris Johnson situation to when an airliner is coming in to land. There is a point where you hear the captain says you're landing, fasten seat belts etc and you know you're definitely coming down. He believes Boris is at that point - he's definitely on the way out now and Parris then speculates on who is likely to replace him, judging from what he hears on the grapevine. They want rid of Boris and it's just a matter of who takes over. He puts Sunak top of the list - apparently the polls place him top in `Who is the UK's best politician' surveys. He's been carefully keeping out of the recent sleaze debate. Next is Jeremy Hunt who isn't tainted by Boris. Then the choice of the right wing...Liz Truss who is seen as `a safe pair of hands'...and Priti Patel (`Yes, really', writes Parris ). Michael Gove is the choice of the `intellectual, thoughtful' Tories but Parris believes Gove doesn't want the job and likes his present job too much.

[Stanley]

Funnily enough I can see the heat being taken off Boris by what I believe is coming down the line. Much of commerce and industry in the country is still waiting for the 'present exceptional circumstances' to recede. The problem is that whist this is what the spin doctors would like you to believe, what we are seeing developing is the new normal. In the case of Brexit this hasn't happened yet as the negotiating of the 'oven ready' deal is still happening but under the guise of 'discussions' about Ireland and the border in the Irish Sea. The other circumstance is Covid and I don't think it has dawned on most people yet that everything has changed and we are not going back to how things were before. Therefore I believe that over Xmas and into the New Year we are going to see what the BofE has already forecast, at least two years of high inflation and financial squeeze on the lower 50 percentile of the population.
If I am right and this is the case, any agitation inside the Tory Party is going to be about the effects of Covid and Brexit. The shine will go off Sunak and people will be asking Priti 'Orrible about migrant numbers. The refurbishment costs of Number Ten will become small beer and many with snouts in the trough will want Johnson in place to defend them because he can't attack them without including himself, his snout has been as deep as anyone else's!
This is the ideal time for a concerted attack on the government by the Opposition but I'm afraid Labour are not up to it and the Liberals have lost all power and credibility.
Meanwhile.... Read THIS BBC report about the debate on standards. Ostensibly it's about Quasi Kwarteng having to apologise for suggesting that Ms Stone, the Commissioner, should resign but actually it is an account of how the Tory Party has once again made a complete mess of handling what should have been a simple vote to reverse the earlier mistake. Read it and weep.

[Stanley]

See THIS comment by Laura Kuenssberg on the ongoing row in Parliament over sleaze. This is mainly about Johnson having to pre-empt Kier Starmer's announcement yesterday but underlying it is a major crisis for the PM and his party.
See this from another BBC report....
Boris Johnson will face a raft of questions across Parliament later as a row about MPs' second jobs continues to engulf Westminster. The spotlight has been shone on the additional roles held by MPs since Tory Owen Paterson was found to have broken lobbying rules as a paid consultant. The PM announced plans on Tuesday to ban MPs from holding that type of job. But Labour claimed the government was "watering down" its own proposals, due to be debated on Wednesday. BBC Newsnight's Nick Watt said there was a "growing and angry backlash" from Tory MPs about a lack of consultation over his plan and the extent of the restrictions. As well as facing MPs during his weekly appearance at Prime Minister's Questions from 12:00 GMT, Mr Johnson will also appear before the Liaison Committee at 15:30 and is expected speak to a gathering of his own backbench MPs in the evening.
That last item about the liaison committee is significant. When Johnson was at the peak of his influence he hardly ever appeared before them, now he has no choice.

[Stanley]

Early reports say that Priti Patel is going to establish processing centres in Albania to process immigrants who cross the channel. It is hoped that the prospect of being held in Albania will deter illegal migrants. Nothing on the web yet.....

[Stanley]

I listened to Grant Shapps doing his imitation of Johnson in booster mode as he announced the changes to HS2. I couldn't help remembering he is the Cabinet Minister for the 'Northern Powerhouse' project as well as being in charge of transport. But what does he know about the North or transport? (LINK)
There has been a reaction in the North of England.

[Big Kev]

Screenshot_20211118-171850_Facebook.jpg

[Stanley]

That's so close to the truth it demonstrates how surreal the situation is at the moment.

[Stanley]

Looking at the political news this morning, Frost under fire from the EU for bringing problems to the table. Patel ditto for making a complete horlicks of immigration and Johnson getting flak as his cunning wheeze for fixing social care blows up in his face. So, business as usual.
Cheer up! Only 33 days to Xmas......

[plaques]

People are under the misapprehension that our un-elected Brexit minister Frost is there to get Brexit done. The truth is that he his there to keep it going as long as possible bringing new and impossible requests to the table as soon as the ones that have been resolved. In this way the UK can always blame the EU's with everything that the UK built into the agreement and signed off. The result is by some magic alchemy it becomes the EU's fault for being intransigent and not facing up to the real issues. The latest statement shown below is typical Frost clouding the issue (sorry about the pun).

The UK’s defacto Brexit minister chided Brussels negotiators for not pushing talks fast enough, stressing that “we need more … urgency if we are to sustain the peace process and protect the Belfast, or Good Friday, Agreement”.

The fact is that its only the DUP party (equivalent to our right-wing Tories) that are dissatisfied the rest of Ireland North and South seem quite happy with the current agreement.

[Tripps]

People say President Biden has 'lost it'. I'd say this from the PM was enough to make him consider his position - or sack some most of his SPADS

Look at this - not a good look on a Monday morning. Did he really say 'supersonic rail links'?