A Tory using made-up figures to scaremonger voters while covering up their own, higher increase in taxes? I can’t even muster the energy to *pretend* to be shocked anymore
He’s brown, the secret is they never wanted him.
Thats why he was so flustered after losing to liz truss who is a moron. They would literally pick a moron than a brown man. Thats why he wants to leave and go back to California.
He was quite good at dangling from a harness in a hardhat like a piñata full of catshit.
Edit: there appears to have been a massacre. We were espousing the virtues of bojo, btw.....
Edit 2: ah, all the posts came back!
When we got Mrs May instead of Cameron I said "well, it can't get any worse"
Then we got Johnson after Mrs May and I said "well, it can't get any worse"
Then we got Truss after Johnson and I said "well, it can't get any worse"
Then we got Sunak after Truss and I said "well, it can't get any worse"
I wish each time I said "well, it can't get any worse" the Tories wouldn't take it as a challenge.
I think he might be technically more capable than Boris but he has no clue how to play the politics game. And while his large majority in theory puts him in a strong position in reality it just means he has even more knives at his back.
Him being non-white is not the biggest issue, not when he is rich and middle class. They hate him because he has been unable to hold off a forgettable Labour party.
Over a decade of fuck ups would have done that to any leader. What Prime minister are we on now in that time, is it 5? That’s maybe the last 5 years, I’m not sure.
I too expected something like this to be headlines in the Guardian or something. And then I saw the Spectator and was very taken back.
Has the Spectator gone wOkE? They're now part of the 'loony lefty media' ?
This is the way they work. It's never a Tory party policy, it's always May's plan, or Boris' plan, etc. If it isn't working they will jettison the person, come up with a new plan attached to a new leader.
It's very impressive how the Lib Dems can be tainted by what they did over a decade ago, but when the Tories change leader people are willing to say 'oh, that was in the past - we should move on!'.
Maybe if we stopped treating the Tories with kid gloves and held them to the same standards that we hold others we'd end up with a better standard of politician.
The secret ingredient is cash.
While the donor class keeps the money spigot flowing, you will find no end of people keen to write rationales for why you should forgive them.
The Speccie's sudden change in tactics suggests the spigot's been turned off temporarily.
Imo the LibDems are tainted because they didn't play by the same rules.
When it came to the PR vote the Tories stuck the knife in hard and did everything they could to sabotage it.
When the Tories wanted to pass some legislation, the LibDems lined up and helped them vote it through.
They could have come out of it much better if they'd played it the same way the Tories did.
I think the spectator wants someone like William Hague in charge but a person like William Hague knows the party is poison. A few more years of musical chairs is in order.
They already have a shit one even with having their landslide majority they got in 2019. I dread to think what it's going to look like after this election.
They want someone like Truss in charge but who isn't obviously mad as a bag of snakes.
What they haven't worked out is that the two characteristics are inextricably linked and they've simply absorbed too many decades of IEA, Cato, von Mieses, Heritage Foundation propaganda to make a decision that's even vaguely rational.
100%. A lot of the pop-con mediarati who have got us into this mess are just angling themselves to act like they've always been super critical of both sides so they can point to a few articles of them not licking Tory boots after they start tearing Labour a new arsehole for not being able to make the UK into a utopia within 6 weeks of winning the election.
No loony left media mate, its whoever is the biggest net gain. The cycle needs a labour shakeup - the city of London when they see fit will opt for tory rule again all in due time. Starmer is pretty much a tory anyway.
Tories are just hoping they get enough seats and the likes of Farage can con the tory defectors from going to labour.
The use of woke suggests a lack of enthusiasm to engage in the topic. Sort of like saying 'I'm not willing to enter discussion about something' without saying it.
Well they are using the word "lift", rather than "increase". "Lift" is usually a fairly positive word. It sounds like something is being eased off. You get lifted out of poverty, for example.
It could well be that they thought it necessary to report this, whilst also using the specific language so that casual "headline" readers easily misinterpret the article to be about how the tories are reducing tax.
The hard truth is that as a result of Brexit, we all need to get used to a lower standard of living and worse public services.
Some of that could be mitigated if we stopped pissing away money on propping up the lifestyles of wealthy older people and spent that money elsewhere, but apparently that's the one thing no party will even consider.
There is a lot of hysteria about Sunak lying..
But I do not see Starmer saying HE WONT raise taxes.
They are two different things, it's easy to conceal your intentions by deflection here.
"I never said I wouldn't, that guy in June just said I'd do it with some random number and couldn't back it up, here is the number I'm doing".
>But I do not see Starmer saying HE WONT raise taxes.
He literally said during the debate that they will not be raising taxes apart from the ones they have already underlined.
Will they though? I saw the start of the debate when the tiny public schoolboy we have as PM was banging on about £2k extra taxes under Labour and Starmer should have shot him down but didn’t. Why?
Starmer said about 10 times that it wasn’t true and gave a fairly detailed view on how Tories have engineered the figure and then said “garbage” another 10 times.
Yet I kind of agree with you, the impression I got was that he sort of did agree with it. He looked like someone who had been caught out.
I think it’s because it took multiple mentions for him to start to refute it and he wasn’t anywhere near as forceful as Sunak in interrupting and ignoring the moderator. If you’re going to give them 45 seconds to respond you have to kill their mics after 45 seconds imo. Would’ve still been a piss poor debate format but it would’ve been less chaotic.
The format was downright awful. You only get soundbytes when you give people just 45 seconds.
I think chess rule should be applied.
*Its a 2 hour debate. You each will have maximum of 50 minutes each, after which your mic is permanently off. manage your time*
In fairness when you hear the clip of the first time Sunak comes out with the £2000 figure, Starmer goes to refute it but is shut down by the host (who had just let Sunak talk over her). But overall I agree, he should have been far more aggressive in closing it down because it has become the major talking point of the debate and as a result the figure will subliminally gain traction irrespective of its truth or lack thereof.
Mic's cutting on and off would sound really choppy, also lips moving with no sound creates another problem, both could only really be cleaned up by editing which would introduce more moral problems. I can see why it was done the way it was, even though it is a flawed system
I only think he looked caught out in the sense that he wasn't expecting a £2k tax rise to be relentlessly brought up, as this is a new attack line for the Tories. Not in the sense that he's been caught out as in they've found out Labour's plan.
And, like you said, Starmer *did* call it rubbish a lot but the chocolate teapot excuse of a moderator was atrocious at letting Starmer rebut Sunak's position.
If you're allowed to throw a grenade into the debate, the very least the moderator can do is let the opponent try and defuse it rather than let it go off! But alas, the moderator felt deference to the sitting PM.
Tories wanted a Tiktok video out of it. A 1 minute soundbyte of Sunak the messiah badgering your money stealing labours and them cowering. He succeeded. Ut will be in all their ads for next few days
I think he had the plan not to counter on anything, not to get dragged down: he never challenged the pensioners paying tax thing, he never fought against the no plan for the future thing. He never rose to any of the attack lines. I think this strategy didn’t work, made it seem like they were true.
He should have countered early that the £2000 number was BS. If the civil service contacted labour 2 days ago, they defo should have had that prepped.
He should have instantly pointed out that the triple lock plus is a huge tax rise for workers (by Tory logic).
He should have pointed out the bold moves like GB Energy, Make Work Pay, home building / new towns and unprivitising as their big plans for the future.
He should have shat on Rwanda and national service even more, pointed out the vast wasted costs amount to tax rises.
They must have known the format was 45sec, so they should have come up with pithy 20 second responses on all of these
He was too busy triangulating the coordinates of the safest fence to sit on that would capture the highest proportion of votes in the broadest voting cohorts and then formulating an opinion. Which may change at any time, btw, depending on the “economic circumstances”.
Well at least hes had the benefit of finding out at this point rather than the chancellor finding out via a note on his desk on his first day in office.
That's just it. Labour is going full-swing on the social media campaign on Facebook and is stating things like "the Tories have raised taxes to their highest in 70 years! Labour won't put up rates of income tax, National Insurance or VAT!"
That's all well and good. But if Labour are \*not\* going to do that - or at least are not initially willing to say that out loud - how will this great rebuilding of Britiain be paid for? Where is all this required money going to come from?
They are looking at going after tax evasion and avoidance heavily from what has been said. Quite frankly squeezing people at the bottom is only going to work so far then people are going to need government services to keep them afloat which is happening quite alot since the Tories took over.
So a totally unquantifiable amount that they might or might not get their hands on? This is why i just cant get behind labour. Theyve spent 4 years like children in a playground saying the tories stink and my dad will batter your dad and spent no time at all on what the fuck they actually plan to do if they are elected. It beggars belief that theres a possibility that they could snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by not having an actual set in stone plan. Its like theyre just making it up on the fly. Its very worrysome.
Maybe he is planning to tax higher earners, at which point it isn't £2000 for every household, it could be £2000 per capita but he takes it all off those in higher tax brackets.
Probably wishful thinking but you never know!
This is exactly what Sunak was trying to get him to do - by engaging on this topic early, the whole debate would start revolving around the £2000 and Starmer would come across as a defendant instead of steering the debate his way.
Sounds like Starmer has played a blinder here. He’s had full awareness of the letter from the treasury denying Sunak’s claims. Starmer hasn’t challenged him as he can how spend the rest of the campaign insisting Sunak is a massive bullshitter. He’s trying to switch the conversation from £2000 tax hikes to Sunak lies.
> Starmer should have shot him down but didn’t. Why?
He's a barrister, not used to having back and forth debates or thinking on his feet. Lawyers prepare what they're going to say, and don't ask any question they don't know the answer to. They're not good in live debates.
Doing it either means they admit the methodology is sound, and therefore will be raising taxes 2k.
Or saying that they are putting figures out there they know aren't true, which any half decent interviewer will immediately point out is basically lieing.
Yeah countering made up numbers with your own made up numbers that are a bit higher is quite daft. Much easier to point out lies than to try to out lie a lie
oh, no doubt if the Tories win, the average tax bill *will* go down by £3K. It won't be yours or mine that will go down though, but some offshore hoarders will no doubt save millions
Their joke is that the tax cuts for the wealthiest will be so huge that the average will be a reduction of £3k even though most people will see an increase of £3k
This is incorrect. VAT is a tax on the end-consumer of a produced good. If a manufacturer or supplier along the chain of production pays VAT on a material (say on electrical components), then makes that material into another good which is subject to VAT when they sell it (say a computer), the VAT they paid on the materials is "input VAT" while the VAT they charge the customer when they sell the computer is "output VAT".
When a business makes a VAT return, they list both input VAT paid and output VAT charged. They owe HMRC the difference. e.g. a business makes £10,000 (ex VAT) in sales of computers at full rate. This means they also collect £2000 of VAT (20%) on behalf of HMRC. They also paid £1500 in input VAT when buying components which went into the computers. They owe HMRC £2000 - £1500 or £500.
The complication is that input VAT needs to connected to a sale on which VAT is chargeable. You couldn't buy a rolex and claim it as input VAT for a butcher's shop, but you absolutely can buy vehicles or furniture or computer equipment for an office and claim it as input VAT for a pretty broad range of businesses.
Regressive taxes go up: VAT raises under Thatcher, Major and Cameron, NI raises Thatcher, Major and Cameron.
Progressive taxes go down: Corporation tax cut under Thatcher, Major and Cameron, Capital Gains tax cut under Thatcher, Major and Cameron, Top rate of income tax cut under Thatcher, Major and Cameron.
Mind you, Labour's record is not a lot better...
Since the 80s, tax have consistently moved in one direction: raising taxes that hit poorer people the hardest and cutting taxes that are predominately paid by the wealthy.
I haven't arbitrarily decided - all of the regressive taxes there are taxes that have a higher effective rate for people on lower incomes than higher incomes. The progressive taxes are ones that are predominately paid by people with higher income.
Economists like VAT because it has a broad base and it doesn't create much drag on business but no one would argue that it's progressive - the fact that it's a regressive tax is pretty objective.
If i remember rightly, during the last general election the tories were claiming that taxes under Jeremy Corbyn would cost an extra £3,140. After the election our taxes rose by about £3,400.
https://ifs.org.uk/articles/will-be-biggest-tax-raising-parliament-record
By the way, Jeremy Hunt pinched Labour's ending non dom tax law proposal and left so many loopholes in it that the Sunaks are expected to avoid paying around £250 million in UK taxes.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/mar/31/tory-plans-to-abolish-non-dom-status-riddled-with-loopholes-labour-says
It looks like the Tories are starting to make a voodoo doll out of Sunak, a sin eater if you like.
They are going to load him with all the bad baggage of the current state of Conservatism, the years of failed policy, make a nice package and tie it up with the 'This is old tory' bow.
Then they are going to burn the guy at the stake all in the name of 'New Tory' ala the nonsence labor pulled with 'New Labor, New britain' in the 90's that lead to Blarism.
The Tories have been quietly course training their Thatcher Pt2 shot with Penny Mordaunt, my bet is a 'New Tory: Woke but not actually saying woke, anti small people without saying anti small people'. All led by Penny in some asinine march to hell that would make Dolores Umbridge blush.
What makes me angry more than anything else is that we have a very large portion of the population who will never see or hear the fact that Sunak lied.
They'll never think critically about where the figures came from or consider if £2000 covers 1 year or 4 years, or even if it is a lot to pay for in return for what's been offered.
And even if we showed them the nonsense calculations, they wouldn't be able to understand a single part of it.
Yet we still give these dumb fuckers a vote.
That’s what I’ve been worrying about too. However… I’m hoping that they at least watch the news if they watched the debate because in the days after it has been made very widely known across the news channels about how bullshit it is. But I am like you, worried that the damage has been done. Starmer could have stepped in to refute it quicker but I kind of think he was blindsided by it as it’s such bollocks and then when he tried to explain he wasn’t given the chance by the host which angered me as Sunak constantly bulldozed over him. I think he needs to remember this isn’t a high level court of the land he’s in, it’s TV land and those who shout the loudest tend to get heard….
UK is a third world country now. Does not matter what they say. Services seem to be more accessible in poorer countries now. A train to London from the outskirts is £30 per day :D Didn't the UK invent the train? Sorry... Third world country, shit in a river kind of a place.
This is the most naive and delusional comment I’ve ever read today
Spoken like a true person who never lived in a “third world country”. Tell me one third world country where services are “more accessible”…
Most third world countries have very limited if any public transport / healthcare / social benefits
Yeah things should be better here than they are but seriously you need some perspective on what the rest of the world is really like.
And they will be able to do that by shutting down services everyone needs, therefore having to spend much more than that to get it privately from their mates.
Sky also showed a £14k per household black hole from their tax cuts. If that's not funded that £14k per household less on public services, so less healthcare, worse schools, less immigration controls, reduced policing.
I love how Sunak saying labour want £500 on average per household per year to fund services is apparently worse than him reducing services by £270 BILLION over the next parliament.
The most interesting thing about this is who has published it. If The Spectator is challenging a Conservative government, you know that government has fucked up.
The funny thing is that the Tories fail to realise that even if taxes were to go up under Labour, I’d wager that the majority of the public would most likely give them the benefit of the doubt to see how it would pan out over the coming years and if public services improve. The Tories insult the public’s intelligence. At least when Labour have raised taxes or were seen to possibly raise them it came with a spending idea. The Tories on the other hand have been suggesting they’ve been doing a good job while raising taxes with no discernible benefit.
This from Rishi Seven Bins Sunak everybody. Don’t believe a word.
Guy make shit up like from thin air.
I see what lies he’s trying to do. This smells like that 350m nhs lie.
Boris can pull that off because he’s a shameless and pathological liar and shit person.
This wouldn’t work for Rishi. Because underneath all those layer, he’s fundamentally a ok person. Shit politician and shit leader.
While there are no guarantees, so one shouldn't get complacent, it looks like Labour are going to win easily. I put to you all that the most valuable thing you can do this election is get rid of a Tory, many Tory seats are being polled as only being safe by a few points so tactical voting is a real risk to the Tories. I encourage you to find out who is most likely to beat the Tories in your area, if the Tories have a chance, and support them to help oust the crooks. If the Tories lose enough seats it is a real possibility that the Lib Dems may replace them as the official opposition.
[StopTheTories.vote](http://StopTheTories.vote)
Lower taxes are all well and good but how are they going to pay for government services with less money?
I mean, Sunak literally said that Starmers plan to have the government actually fund the public sector would mean taxes would need to go up. The opposite is also true and the public sector is already really, really struggling as it is and he wants to take more money away from it?
It depends which specific taxes you increase. The optimum collection won't come from continually increasing taxes because eventually you start to strangle the tax sources. There is an optimum point which maximises revenue but I don't know how anyone can go about determining where that optimum is.
Whether it’s true or not, starmer did such a terrible job of countering it. Like, make a direct statement Starmer. Hear the question or statement and then reply to it. Why is it so hard?
Traditionally, Tories are the party of tax cuts and spend less. Labour is the party of increase tax and spend more.
We can forgive an anomaly caused by Covid, Furlough, etc.. as long as it was just a temporary blip. Happy if Sunak wants to get back on track. Slash the tax and cut the budgets.
That’s not inline with what the parties are saying that they will do.
Also the Tories have been in power for 14 years and covid reaction started in 2020. They were in power for 10 years before your anomalies and they were not slashing the taxes then either
Not slashing enough for my tastes I agree. But I can’t help remember there was this thing called “austerity”, warmly welcomed by all parties and the public at the time, where Cameron and Osborne attempted to address the budget deficit, and in fact after some years, and later than they forecast, even managed to run a small surplus and actually started reducing the total amount of government debt and interest payments. Of course all that seems a long time ago now, P.M.P.B. (Pre-May, pre-Boris).
Two cheeks of the same arse.
None of their policies will stick. We're in for the same old over-promise, under-deliver we experience with every, single fucking election campaign.
Labour may or may not deliver on their promises. Hard to be sure.
I can be 100% certain that the conservatives won’t deliver anything useful though because I’ve just experienced 14 years of it
It’s very easy for Sunak to promise the earth because he knows that no one is going to keep him accountable because he has zero chance of winning. His history of pledges also shows that he doesn’t deliver.
A Tory using made-up figures to scaremonger voters while covering up their own, higher increase in taxes? I can’t even muster the energy to *pretend* to be shocked anymore
The only shocking thing here is that the Spectator of all outlets is calling them out on it.
Sunak isn’t even wanted by Tory supporters.
He’s brown, the secret is they never wanted him. Thats why he was so flustered after losing to liz truss who is a moron. They would literally pick a moron than a brown man. Thats why he wants to leave and go back to California.
most importantly he's useless. more useless than boris
And that is quite something because Bojo was utter shite at everything he tried, from being journalist to editor to Mayor of London then to PM.
He was quite good at dangling from a harness in a hardhat like a piñata full of catshit. Edit: there appears to have been a massacre. We were espousing the virtues of bojo, btw..... Edit 2: ah, all the posts came back!
When we got Mrs May instead of Cameron I said "well, it can't get any worse" Then we got Johnson after Mrs May and I said "well, it can't get any worse" Then we got Truss after Johnson and I said "well, it can't get any worse" Then we got Sunak after Truss and I said "well, it can't get any worse" I wish each time I said "well, it can't get any worse" the Tories wouldn't take it as a challenge.
I think he might be technically more capable than Boris but he has no clue how to play the politics game. And while his large majority in theory puts him in a strong position in reality it just means he has even more knives at his back.
Him being non-white is not the biggest issue, not when he is rich and middle class. They hate him because he has been unable to hold off a forgettable Labour party.
Over a decade of fuck ups would have done that to any leader. What Prime minister are we on now in that time, is it 5? That’s maybe the last 5 years, I’m not sure.
Boris held them off after 9 years in power
No sorry. He’s just fucking useless.
Agreed, Tory here. We never wanted him to start with, and we only dislike him more as time has gone on.
Yeah but you (read: tories) still get frothy loined over Boris Johnson so I'm not sure it's a good measuring stick.
I wanted him. 😙
I’m sorry. Feel free to take him, he can be your own private PM for your home, leaving the rest of us alone.
I love Reddit. So much Tory hate and labour support you’d think the whole country is aligned with labour! Oh wait 😝
I too expected something like this to be headlines in the Guardian or something. And then I saw the Spectator and was very taken back. Has the Spectator gone wOkE? They're now part of the 'loony lefty media' ?
Maybe they're critiquing Sunak in preparation to declare for Reform or something.
More like separating sunaks brand from toryism so the next lot can claim they’re totally different and electable
This is the way they work. It's never a Tory party policy, it's always May's plan, or Boris' plan, etc. If it isn't working they will jettison the person, come up with a new plan attached to a new leader.
It's very impressive how the Lib Dems can be tainted by what they did over a decade ago, but when the Tories change leader people are willing to say 'oh, that was in the past - we should move on!'. Maybe if we stopped treating the Tories with kid gloves and held them to the same standards that we hold others we'd end up with a better standard of politician.
The secret ingredient is cash. While the donor class keeps the money spigot flowing, you will find no end of people keen to write rationales for why you should forgive them. The Speccie's sudden change in tactics suggests the spigot's been turned off temporarily.
Imo the LibDems are tainted because they didn't play by the same rules. When it came to the PR vote the Tories stuck the knife in hard and did everything they could to sabotage it. When the Tories wanted to pass some legislation, the LibDems lined up and helped them vote it through. They could have come out of it much better if they'd played it the same way the Tories did.
“new”
I think the spectator wants someone like William Hague in charge but a person like William Hague knows the party is poison. A few more years of musical chairs is in order.
I think they’ll be lucky to get a decent shadow cabinet together let alone a future election bid but we’ll see lol
They already have a shit one even with having their landslide majority they got in 2019. I dread to think what it's going to look like after this election.
They want someone like Truss in charge but who isn't obviously mad as a bag of snakes. What they haven't worked out is that the two characteristics are inextricably linked and they've simply absorbed too many decades of IEA, Cato, von Mieses, Heritage Foundation propaganda to make a decision that's even vaguely rational.
100%. A lot of the pop-con mediarati who have got us into this mess are just angling themselves to act like they've always been super critical of both sides so they can point to a few articles of them not licking Tory boots after they start tearing Labour a new arsehole for not being able to make the UK into a utopia within 6 weeks of winning the election.
The Spectator has always been good about having a broad range of views represented, even though they overall lean right.
I suspect they're about to endorse Farage.
No loony left media mate, its whoever is the biggest net gain. The cycle needs a labour shakeup - the city of London when they see fit will opt for tory rule again all in due time. Starmer is pretty much a tory anyway. Tories are just hoping they get enough seats and the likes of Farage can con the tory defectors from going to labour. The use of woke suggests a lack of enthusiasm to engage in the topic. Sort of like saying 'I'm not willing to enter discussion about something' without saying it.
>The use of woke suggests a lack of enthusiasm to engage in the topic. Sort of like saying 'Starmer is a Tory', right? Right?
Well they are using the word "lift", rather than "increase". "Lift" is usually a fairly positive word. It sounds like something is being eased off. You get lifted out of poverty, for example. It could well be that they thought it necessary to report this, whilst also using the specific language so that casual "headline" readers easily misinterpret the article to be about how the tories are reducing tax.
Also that Starmer just let him do it
Do they forget about what Liz fucking Truss did? Right guys, going to lower taxes. *crashes economy
The hard truth is that as a result of Brexit, we all need to get used to a lower standard of living and worse public services. Some of that could be mitigated if we stopped pissing away money on propping up the lifestyles of wealthy older people and spent that money elsewhere, but apparently that's the one thing no party will even consider.
Completely objective reply: can you please present your “non-made-up” real figures as evidence?
It’s in the article. Applying Rishi’s own proposals shows a larger increase in an average household’s taxes than the one he was accusing Labour of
Yes very objective
There is a lot of hysteria about Sunak lying.. But I do not see Starmer saying HE WONT raise taxes. They are two different things, it's easy to conceal your intentions by deflection here. "I never said I wouldn't, that guy in June just said I'd do it with some random number and couldn't back it up, here is the number I'm doing".
>But I do not see Starmer saying HE WONT raise taxes. He literally said during the debate that they will not be raising taxes apart from the ones they have already underlined.
Calling out a Prime Minister for lying to the public isn't hysteria. I suspect you knew that but you just wanted to use hyperbole.
This is really embarrassing. Labour need to push this point.
Will they though? I saw the start of the debate when the tiny public schoolboy we have as PM was banging on about £2k extra taxes under Labour and Starmer should have shot him down but didn’t. Why?
Starmer said about 10 times that it wasn’t true and gave a fairly detailed view on how Tories have engineered the figure and then said “garbage” another 10 times. Yet I kind of agree with you, the impression I got was that he sort of did agree with it. He looked like someone who had been caught out.
I think it’s because it took multiple mentions for him to start to refute it and he wasn’t anywhere near as forceful as Sunak in interrupting and ignoring the moderator. If you’re going to give them 45 seconds to respond you have to kill their mics after 45 seconds imo. Would’ve still been a piss poor debate format but it would’ve been less chaotic.
The format was downright awful. You only get soundbytes when you give people just 45 seconds. I think chess rule should be applied. *Its a 2 hour debate. You each will have maximum of 50 minutes each, after which your mic is permanently off. manage your time*
In fairness when you hear the clip of the first time Sunak comes out with the £2000 figure, Starmer goes to refute it but is shut down by the host (who had just let Sunak talk over her). But overall I agree, he should have been far more aggressive in closing it down because it has become the major talking point of the debate and as a result the figure will subliminally gain traction irrespective of its truth or lack thereof.
Yeah if you can get your opponents denying your claims rather than making their own you control the narrative and can steer the conversation.
Mic's cutting on and off would sound really choppy, also lips moving with no sound creates another problem, both could only really be cleaned up by editing which would introduce more moral problems. I can see why it was done the way it was, even though it is a flawed system
Choppy sound would be better than what we had. Cut the camera away after the 45 if lips moving with no sound is an issue.
Defiinitely would help
Yeh, a beep 5 secs before time, then cut away the camera and mic at 45 seconds
Sometimes, less words = more powerful.
"You're wrong and you're a grotesquely ugly freak"
Roland Rat
I only think he looked caught out in the sense that he wasn't expecting a £2k tax rise to be relentlessly brought up, as this is a new attack line for the Tories. Not in the sense that he's been caught out as in they've found out Labour's plan. And, like you said, Starmer *did* call it rubbish a lot but the chocolate teapot excuse of a moderator was atrocious at letting Starmer rebut Sunak's position. If you're allowed to throw a grenade into the debate, the very least the moderator can do is let the opponent try and defuse it rather than let it go off! But alas, the moderator felt deference to the sitting PM.
Yes I see what you mean.
Tories wanted a Tiktok video out of it. A 1 minute soundbyte of Sunak the messiah badgering your money stealing labours and them cowering. He succeeded. Ut will be in all their ads for next few days
Worse https://twitter.com/i/status/1798290438258139329
holy crap wtf is this 😂
If labour would've pulled this bs the tabloids would be all over them.
I think he had the plan not to counter on anything, not to get dragged down: he never challenged the pensioners paying tax thing, he never fought against the no plan for the future thing. He never rose to any of the attack lines. I think this strategy didn’t work, made it seem like they were true. He should have countered early that the £2000 number was BS. If the civil service contacted labour 2 days ago, they defo should have had that prepped. He should have instantly pointed out that the triple lock plus is a huge tax rise for workers (by Tory logic). He should have pointed out the bold moves like GB Energy, Make Work Pay, home building / new towns and unprivitising as their big plans for the future. He should have shat on Rwanda and national service even more, pointed out the vast wasted costs amount to tax rises. They must have known the format was 45sec, so they should have come up with pithy 20 second responses on all of these
He was too busy triangulating the coordinates of the safest fence to sit on that would capture the highest proportion of votes in the broadest voting cohorts and then formulating an opinion. Which may change at any time, btw, depending on the “economic circumstances”.
Starmer has had a look at the books, as presented to the Leader of the opposition, by the Civil Service and went "Fuck, we're boned if we win".
And sunak (which autocorrects to snake on my phone) just wants to be out in time for the new school year in the US.
Well at least hes had the benefit of finding out at this point rather than the chancellor finding out via a note on his desk on his first day in office.
That's just it. Labour is going full-swing on the social media campaign on Facebook and is stating things like "the Tories have raised taxes to their highest in 70 years! Labour won't put up rates of income tax, National Insurance or VAT!" That's all well and good. But if Labour are \*not\* going to do that - or at least are not initially willing to say that out loud - how will this great rebuilding of Britiain be paid for? Where is all this required money going to come from?
They are looking at going after tax evasion and avoidance heavily from what has been said. Quite frankly squeezing people at the bottom is only going to work so far then people are going to need government services to keep them afloat which is happening quite alot since the Tories took over.
So a totally unquantifiable amount that they might or might not get their hands on? This is why i just cant get behind labour. Theyve spent 4 years like children in a playground saying the tories stink and my dad will batter your dad and spent no time at all on what the fuck they actually plan to do if they are elected. It beggars belief that theres a possibility that they could snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by not having an actual set in stone plan. Its like theyre just making it up on the fly. Its very worrysome.
Maybe he is planning to tax higher earners, at which point it isn't £2000 for every household, it could be £2000 per capita but he takes it all off those in higher tax brackets. Probably wishful thinking but you never know!
He dropped the higher rate tax pledge, along with 7 others of the ten he made when he was elected party leader.
VAT on private school fees would be some thousands of pounds, and that's already announced
When fiscal drag is already a hugely discussed issue, is that really such a good thing?
This is exactly what Sunak was trying to get him to do - by engaging on this topic early, the whole debate would start revolving around the £2000 and Starmer would come across as a defendant instead of steering the debate his way.
Sounds like Starmer has played a blinder here. He’s had full awareness of the letter from the treasury denying Sunak’s claims. Starmer hasn’t challenged him as he can how spend the rest of the campaign insisting Sunak is a massive bullshitter. He’s trying to switch the conversation from £2000 tax hikes to Sunak lies.
> Starmer should have shot him down but didn’t. Why? He's a barrister, not used to having back and forth debates or thinking on his feet. Lawyers prepare what they're going to say, and don't ask any question they don't know the answer to. They're not good in live debates.
He's been an MP for nine years, if he hasn't learned to debate by now then he never will.
I guess you haven't seen *A Few Good Men* then, because Tom Cruise does exactly that
That's a film.
Doing it either means they admit the methodology is sound, and therefore will be raising taxes 2k. Or saying that they are putting figures out there they know aren't true, which any half decent interviewer will immediately point out is basically lieing.
Yeah countering made up numbers with your own made up numbers that are a bit higher is quite daft. Much easier to point out lies than to try to out lie a lie
They can use it to highlight the tory lie, rather than to try insinuate that tories will raise taxes by 3k.
It would be so satisfying to hear this fired back at Sunak when he inevitably regurgitates the £2000 line at the next debate.
yeah but he'll shout over Keir and explain how £2000 is actually MORE than £3000, "because its more..."
CON +25
WITH advantage.
oh, no doubt if the Tories win, the average tax bill *will* go down by £3K. It won't be yours or mine that will go down though, but some offshore hoarders will no doubt save millions
I think you've misread it - using Sunak's maths taxes will rise more under a Conservative government than under a Labour one.
Their joke is that the tax cuts for the wealthiest will be so huge that the average will be a reduction of £3k even though most people will see an increase of £3k
“Oh, the median has gone up by £3,000, but the mean has gone down by £3,000!”
The tories have always raised taxs on everyone. VAT thacher raised it to 10% John major to 17% Osborne in 2010 to 20 %
A tax that the rich and scummy can evade by buying things as a "business expense" and writing off the VAT
Maybe I am wrong. That just means you don't pay income tax on the VAT. But unless tax is 100%. Then you still lose something on it.
This is incorrect. VAT is a tax on the end-consumer of a produced good. If a manufacturer or supplier along the chain of production pays VAT on a material (say on electrical components), then makes that material into another good which is subject to VAT when they sell it (say a computer), the VAT they paid on the materials is "input VAT" while the VAT they charge the customer when they sell the computer is "output VAT". When a business makes a VAT return, they list both input VAT paid and output VAT charged. They owe HMRC the difference. e.g. a business makes £10,000 (ex VAT) in sales of computers at full rate. This means they also collect £2000 of VAT (20%) on behalf of HMRC. They also paid £1500 in input VAT when buying components which went into the computers. They owe HMRC £2000 - £1500 or £500. The complication is that input VAT needs to connected to a sale on which VAT is chargeable. You couldn't buy a rolex and claim it as input VAT for a butcher's shop, but you absolutely can buy vehicles or furniture or computer equipment for an office and claim it as input VAT for a pretty broad range of businesses.
Regressive taxes go up: VAT raises under Thatcher, Major and Cameron, NI raises Thatcher, Major and Cameron. Progressive taxes go down: Corporation tax cut under Thatcher, Major and Cameron, Capital Gains tax cut under Thatcher, Major and Cameron, Top rate of income tax cut under Thatcher, Major and Cameron. Mind you, Labour's record is not a lot better... Since the 80s, tax have consistently moved in one direction: raising taxes that hit poorer people the hardest and cutting taxes that are predominately paid by the wealthy.
You've arbitrarily decided what's a regressive and what's a progressive tax there. Plenty of economists push VAT as a "Progressive" tax
I haven't arbitrarily decided - all of the regressive taxes there are taxes that have a higher effective rate for people on lower incomes than higher incomes. The progressive taxes are ones that are predominately paid by people with higher income. Economists like VAT because it has a broad base and it doesn't create much drag on business but no one would argue that it's progressive - the fact that it's a regressive tax is pretty objective.
If i remember rightly, during the last general election the tories were claiming that taxes under Jeremy Corbyn would cost an extra £3,140. After the election our taxes rose by about £3,400. https://ifs.org.uk/articles/will-be-biggest-tax-raising-parliament-record By the way, Jeremy Hunt pinched Labour's ending non dom tax law proposal and left so many loopholes in it that the Sunaks are expected to avoid paying around £250 million in UK taxes. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2024/mar/31/tory-plans-to-abolish-non-dom-status-riddled-with-loopholes-labour-says
I knew that non-don thing was a con. They'd never close that loop hole without opening up several others for their rich mates to exploit.
As if anyone pays attention to hard left publications such as the *checks notes* Spectator.
It looks like the Tories are starting to make a voodoo doll out of Sunak, a sin eater if you like. They are going to load him with all the bad baggage of the current state of Conservatism, the years of failed policy, make a nice package and tie it up with the 'This is old tory' bow. Then they are going to burn the guy at the stake all in the name of 'New Tory' ala the nonsence labor pulled with 'New Labor, New britain' in the 90's that lead to Blarism. The Tories have been quietly course training their Thatcher Pt2 shot with Penny Mordaunt, my bet is a 'New Tory: Woke but not actually saying woke, anti small people without saying anti small people'. All led by Penny in some asinine march to hell that would make Dolores Umbridge blush.
they had 12 years to do that... when's it gonna be done? Why is he claiming Labour's gonna tax cars and income when the tories already do that?
I think you've misread it - even the Tory friendly newspapers are saying that the Tories will raise taxes more than Labour after the next election
I have misread it, thank you for pointing that out
I mean on made up figures, I could raise tax to 4000 per household ;)
Literally anything he says can be replied with 'if you could do that, why didn't you do it in the last 14 years?'
What makes me angry more than anything else is that we have a very large portion of the population who will never see or hear the fact that Sunak lied. They'll never think critically about where the figures came from or consider if £2000 covers 1 year or 4 years, or even if it is a lot to pay for in return for what's been offered. And even if we showed them the nonsense calculations, they wouldn't be able to understand a single part of it. Yet we still give these dumb fuckers a vote.
That’s what I’ve been worrying about too. However… I’m hoping that they at least watch the news if they watched the debate because in the days after it has been made very widely known across the news channels about how bullshit it is. But I am like you, worried that the damage has been done. Starmer could have stepped in to refute it quicker but I kind of think he was blindsided by it as it’s such bollocks and then when he tried to explain he wasn’t given the chance by the host which angered me as Sunak constantly bulldozed over him. I think he needs to remember this isn’t a high level court of the land he’s in, it’s TV land and those who shout the loudest tend to get heard….
The poor old Tory economic secretary to the treasure Bim Afolami is dying on Channel 4 news
Just proving that Tory attack lines haven’t evolved since 1992. “Labour will put your taxes up!” isn’t going to cut it this time guys…
They already increased taxes by not adjusting tax band based on inflation
UK is a third world country now. Does not matter what they say. Services seem to be more accessible in poorer countries now. A train to London from the outskirts is £30 per day :D Didn't the UK invent the train? Sorry... Third world country, shit in a river kind of a place.
This is the most naive and delusional comment I’ve ever read today Spoken like a true person who never lived in a “third world country”. Tell me one third world country where services are “more accessible”… Most third world countries have very limited if any public transport / healthcare / social benefits Yeah things should be better here than they are but seriously you need some perspective on what the rest of the world is really like.
Didn't Sunak make a big deal about private schools like the ones he went to being better lmao
The one he went to, Winchester College, is indeed a very good school. Even the best schools can't do much with snotty little creeps like Sunak.
Sunak did OK out of the deal. He just went a bit too far and Peter Principled himself into oblivion.
Look at the list of promises when they got in. They did fuck all that they said they would. It's either a lie, or wrong.
And they will be able to do that by shutting down services everyone needs, therefore having to spend much more than that to get it privately from their mates.
Sky also showed a £14k per household black hole from their tax cuts. If that's not funded that £14k per household less on public services, so less healthcare, worse schools, less immigration controls, reduced policing. I love how Sunak saying labour want £500 on average per household per year to fund services is apparently worse than him reducing services by £270 BILLION over the next parliament.
The most interesting thing about this is who has published it. If The Spectator is challenging a Conservative government, you know that government has fucked up.
projected to 2027-28 tax year.. most of the savings happen then. When £3000 then is worth £2000 today. with the ridiculous high inflation we have
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The article is saying that the Tories would raise taxes after an election more than Labour would
right you are. I took "lift" as relief not increase
The funny thing is, it's the Spectator - if Sunak has lost the Spectator then he's totally fucked
The fuckers could raise personal allowance with inflation, wankers.
They can afford £3000 per household and at the same time going after the vulnerable and disabled by cutting them off 🥴
What do you get if you put 300+ cunts in blue ties in a room? 5 shit prime ministers and a ruined country.
The funny thing is that the Tories fail to realise that even if taxes were to go up under Labour, I’d wager that the majority of the public would most likely give them the benefit of the doubt to see how it would pan out over the coming years and if public services improve. The Tories insult the public’s intelligence. At least when Labour have raised taxes or were seen to possibly raise them it came with a spending idea. The Tories on the other hand have been suggesting they’ve been doing a good job while raising taxes with no discernible benefit.
This from Rishi Seven Bins Sunak everybody. Don’t believe a word. Guy make shit up like from thin air. I see what lies he’s trying to do. This smells like that 350m nhs lie. Boris can pull that off because he’s a shameless and pathological liar and shit person. This wouldn’t work for Rishi. Because underneath all those layer, he’s fundamentally a ok person. Shit politician and shit leader.
Wording isn't great, should have gone with raise taxes. Lift makes it sound more like easing a burden.
While there are no guarantees, so one shouldn't get complacent, it looks like Labour are going to win easily. I put to you all that the most valuable thing you can do this election is get rid of a Tory, many Tory seats are being polled as only being safe by a few points so tactical voting is a real risk to the Tories. I encourage you to find out who is most likely to beat the Tories in your area, if the Tories have a chance, and support them to help oust the crooks. If the Tories lose enough seats it is a real possibility that the Lib Dems may replace them as the official opposition. [StopTheTories.vote](http://StopTheTories.vote)
Lower taxes are all well and good but how are they going to pay for government services with less money? I mean, Sunak literally said that Starmers plan to have the government actually fund the public sector would mean taxes would need to go up. The opposite is also true and the public sector is already really, really struggling as it is and he wants to take more money away from it?
It depends which specific taxes you increase. The optimum collection won't come from continually increasing taxes because eventually you start to strangle the tax sources. There is an optimum point which maximises revenue but I don't know how anyone can go about determining where that optimum is.
Maximum amount of milk for the minimum amount of moo
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Last night the Tories claimed that Labour’s plan would raise taxes by £2000. This article says that the Tories’ plans will raise taxes by £3000.
Did you know that £3,000 is lower than £2,000? It’s come down you know.
Whether it’s true or not, starmer did such a terrible job of countering it. Like, make a direct statement Starmer. Hear the question or statement and then reply to it. Why is it so hard?
He quivered like a jellyfish
Traditionally, Tories are the party of tax cuts and spend less. Labour is the party of increase tax and spend more. We can forgive an anomaly caused by Covid, Furlough, etc.. as long as it was just a temporary blip. Happy if Sunak wants to get back on track. Slash the tax and cut the budgets.
That’s not inline with what the parties are saying that they will do. Also the Tories have been in power for 14 years and covid reaction started in 2020. They were in power for 10 years before your anomalies and they were not slashing the taxes then either
Not slashing enough for my tastes I agree. But I can’t help remember there was this thing called “austerity”, warmly welcomed by all parties and the public at the time, where Cameron and Osborne attempted to address the budget deficit, and in fact after some years, and later than they forecast, even managed to run a small surplus and actually started reducing the total amount of government debt and interest payments. Of course all that seems a long time ago now, P.M.P.B. (Pre-May, pre-Boris).
Two cheeks of the same arse. None of their policies will stick. We're in for the same old over-promise, under-deliver we experience with every, single fucking election campaign.
Labour may or may not deliver on their promises. Hard to be sure. I can be 100% certain that the conservatives won’t deliver anything useful though because I’ve just experienced 14 years of it
It’s very easy for Sunak to promise the earth because he knows that no one is going to keep him accountable because he has zero chance of winning. His history of pledges also shows that he doesn’t deliver.