Mailwatch(ed) Forum

Hope this thread becomes busy over the coming months of Tory meltdown.

Kay Burley sounds as if she hasn’t covered a labour correspondent story for 35 years.


I hope Mick Lynch fills the ‘says it like it is’ gobshite chair on Question Time, now Farage’s stock has plummeted.

What was she expecting/hoping for, a re-run of the Battle of Orgreave?

Kudos to Mick Lynch.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/20 ... enthusiasm

John Crace on Grant Shapps vs Louise Haigh.

Everyone wanted a decent pay rise, he continued. Only the dispute wasn’t about money, he insisted. Which will come as news to many of those going on strike. It was about terms and conditions. And by the way, revenues were 20% down since the pandemic, so strikers could whistle for the cash. Not that it was about the money.

The shadow transport secretary, Louise Haigh, was at her best in reply. A channel of righteous anger. She really did not want the strikes to go ahead either, but she respected the right of unions to go on strike. It was called the democratic process. And she knew where most of the blame lay. With Shapps himself. The minister who had gone missing in action. The man who had done most to ensure the strikes went ahead with his hands-off approach to industrial action.

How come he had barely lifted a finger? Only giving the employers a negotiating mandate at the last possible minute. It was a grave dereliction of duty. A failure of leadership. The talks were nothing but a sham. Set up to fail. Shapps held out his hands in a show of faux innocence.

Haigh pressed on. How was it also that he was now proposing to use the same P&O playbook of bringing in cheaper agency workers that he condemned only a few months ago? The Labour government in Wales had reached an agreement with the unions and there would be no strikes there. Why couldn’t he have done the same? Shapps had been quick to praise rail workers for keeping going during the pandemic, now he had turned on them. Whatever had happened to the Convict’s high-wage economy?

Whatever had happened to the Convict’s high-wage economy?

Less than a month since Shapps and every other Tory welcomed workers shaking down employers suffering labour shortages. None seem keen to back them now foreigners can’t be put in the frame. And even from right wing economic liberal POV, creating labour shortages as a policy is the dumbest idea ever as a means to raise living standards.

Getting fed up of BTL comments having a go at "overpaid train drivers".

One - the main drivers union, ASLEF, ain't on strike.

Two - having had a go, I can assure you that driving even a light engine is challenging at no more than 25mph. Being constantly aware of signals and speed restrictions along the route, keeping an eye out for potential hazards at level crossings, knowing how and when to apply brakes and how to do it without spilling the passengers' tea - what must it be like at 125mph with eleven coaches behind, or 60mph with 2,000 tons?

Yebbut but they just sit down in a chair for most of the shift so how strenuous can it be really?

Impressed with Mick Lynch on Channel 4 News tonight, held himself well among some boorish questions from Cathy Newman (though possibly submitted by RightMinds columnists).

I've been impressed with Mick Lynch too, he seems very capable. The Scargill comparisons are as inaccurate as they are unfair.

I have been too. Think he's brought Sunak and Johnson into it well. That's where the trouble with railways lies, not just with this strike, but with the failure to fund a proper post-Covid recovery plan.

Nigredo wrote: ↑Tue Jun 21, 2022 7:25 pm Impressed with Mick Lynch on Channel 4 News tonight, held himself well among some boorish questions from Cathy Newman (though possibly submitted by RightMinds columnists).

You have to be able to fight your corner and I assume Lynch has been doing this for decades.

Problem with this strike is it effects those journalists primary as they use the train, so I do find the coverage quite problematic. Cost of Living meanwhile that’s not important as they are fine with that, leave that to the likes of Jack Malone.

Anyhow shouldn’t this be in other politics

Spotted in a YT comment section:

Just watched this video and it’s cheered me up ,after those communists went on strike and stopped me from going to The Installers show at the NEC, The first one for us plumbing and gas engineers since the Kung Flu.

Boo hoo. Drive yer van there.

How much does Lyndon Crosby invoice for this cunning strategy? Lets pretend the opposition are in charge and we’re not.

Campaigning, not governing.

The same fucking shit since December 2019.

Yet there are enough stupid fuckers out there who'll believe the ruddy-faced twat.

Just watched this video and it’s cheered me up ,after those communists went on strike and stopped me from going to The Installers show at the NEC, The first one for us plumbing and gas engineers since the Kung Flu.

Thought for a second that The Installers must be some crap Britpop hasbeens who somehow I’d never even heard of.

Boiler wrote: ↑Wed Jun 22, 2022 9:28 am Campaigning, not governing.

The same fucking shit since December 2019.

Yet there are enough stupid fuckers out there who'll believe the ruddy-faced twat.

It's as much about denying others power (maybe moreso) as it is about exercising it.

I see that, this week, people working from home are heroic strike breakers. Has anyone asked Rees-Mogg for a comment yet?

No but chuckle brother Jonathan Gullis has had a go:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/h ... 05988.html