Mailwatch(ed) Forum

The perfect response to the Tory national service insanity:

https://www.threads.net/@jameswillby/post/C7bAIbuI18c/

Apparently the plan is to set up a royal commission after the election to consider the finer detail. So this is actually a pipedream rather than a serious policy proposal.

satnav wrote:Apparently the plan is to set up a royal commission after the election to consider the finer detail. So this is actually a pipedream rather than a serious policy proposal.

And is counterproductive in that it now has the retired colonels and their ilk out in the shires discussing how stupid the Tories are.

satnav wrote: ↑Sun May 26, 2024 10:05 am Apparently the plan is to set up a royal commission after the election to consider the finer detail. So this is actually a pipedream rather than a serious policy proposal.

Party of government demonstrate they can't conduct a simple election campaign.
Then go on to demonstrate they can't brainstorm a policy.

If this were a challenge featuring a mob of Hoorays on the Apprentice it would be entertaining.
These people are in charge of our lives and our nation.

Am I alone wondering.

This National Service thing's too bad to be true.

What complete shitshow is it dead-catting for?

Bones McCoy wrote: ↑Sun May 26, 2024 11:22 am
These people are in charge of our lives and our nation.

Not for much longer.

The national service policy has gone down well with the local gammons on the town FB page. “Never did my generation any harm,” claim people in their 70s.

Talk of military service has always gone down well with the people who won't have to do it. 500 years ago Erasmus said "Dulce bellum inexpertis", and he was only rehashing something Plato had said over 1500 years before that.

The omnishambles continues.
CCHQ has compiled a list of Tory MPs who are - shall we say - sub par in performance. OK.
They have then emailed the list - which allegedly includes details of a wife's medical condition - to all candidates.



Seems that this plays to the growing sense that this campaign is purely in the hands of Ricki and his SPADs, a group that seems to have been recruited on their connections rather than their talent.

Perhaps they should have given the job to a couple of 18 year olds on National Service...

Andy Street doesn't fancy it.

Birmingham City Council is looking for a new Chief Executive and the strong rumour is that
Street is in the frame for it, if not the favourite for the job. It has its challenges, for sure, but it pays a damn sight better than an MP's salary. I'm sure Andy is eyeing it up.

Youngian wrote: ↑Sun May 26, 2024 8:36 am

Yug wrote: ↑Sun May 26, 2024 7:45 am A big argument against it comes from the armed forces themselves. They don't want to be wasting their time and resources nannying surly teenagers who don't really want to be there.

Conscripts are handy as cannon fodder to keep your hardened professional soldiers alive. Project Fear you say? Yeh I’ll give you Project Fear while canvassing young parents on the doorstep. But there’s always community service so your kids can be treated like criminals at the weekends.

There was a woman at Sunak's press conference in Stoke this morning asking if the scheme could be extended to older people, for example, prisoners and ex prisoners, because her two sons're in their twenties and thirties, in her words "more brawn than brains", and would have benefited from it.

Suspected translation: both are dumb as a bag of hammers, both have done time in one of HM's holiday camps, and could someone please babysit them and actually see if they could do something useful?

Sunak was non-commital.

I don't doubt that the organisations involved would be just as thrilled with a bunch of recalcitrant prisoners as a bunch of surly teenagers, even without the potential safeguarding issues.

Samanfur wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 1:35 pm
There was a woman at Sunak's press conference in Stoke this morning asking if the scheme could be extended to older people, for example, prisoners and ex prisoners, because her two sons're in their twenties and thirties, in her words "more brawn than brains", and would have benefited from it.

Suspected translation: both are dumb as a bag of hammers, both have done time in one of HM's holiday camps, and could someone please babysit them and actually see if they could do something useful?

Sunak was non-commital.

I don't doubt that the organisations involved would be just as thrilled with a bunch of recalcitrant prisoners as a bunch of surly teenagers, even without the potential safeguarding issues.

They already do a fair bit of that. A bloke I knew at university joined the army, and one time I saw him he was joking about how he was spending too much time in court with soldiers who'd been nudged towards the army by judges, but had carried on committing crimes. Another time I saw him he was more positive about what you could achieve in time. So I guess it works sometimes, and sometimes it doesn't. This was some time before the big MOD cuts.

I doubt the army wants many more young offenders heading their way though.

CEOs of public companies don’t butt into GE campaigns, not even a good try.
https://x.com/implausibleblog/status/17 ... Dkr8MiQKBg

We’ve reached peak Tory, a former army colonel who now writes in the Telegraph about the need for ungrateful young layabouts to do national service.

Tubby Isaacs wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 2:05 pm

Samanfur wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 1:35 pm
There was a woman at Sunak's press conference in Stoke this morning asking if the scheme could be extended to older people, for example, prisoners and ex prisoners, because her two sons're in their twenties and thirties, in her words "more brawn than brains", and would have benefited from it.

Suspected translation: both are dumb as a bag of hammers, both have done time in one of HM's holiday camps, and could someone please babysit them and actually see if they could do something useful?

Sunak was non-commital.

I don't doubt that the organisations involved would be just as thrilled with a bunch of recalcitrant prisoners as a bunch of surly teenagers, even without the potential safeguarding issues.

They already do a fair bit of that. A bloke I knew at university joined the army, and one time I saw him he was joking about how he was spending too much time in court with soldiers who'd been nudged towards the army by judges, but had carried on committing crimes. Another time I saw him he was more positive about what you could achieve in time. So I guess it works sometimes, and sometimes it doesn't. This was some time before the big MOD cuts.

I doubt the army wants many more young offenders heading their way though.

You could say the same about every form of rehabilitation. Sometimes the carrot works and sometimes the stick.

Youngian wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 4:11 pm We’ve reached peak Tory, a former army colonel who now writes in the Telegraph about the need for ungrateful young layabouts to do national service.

Furlough? They were at primary school.

Tubby Isaacs wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 6:13 pm

Youngian wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 4:11 pm We’ve reached peak Tory, a former army colonel who now writes in the Telegraph about the need for ungrateful young layabouts to do national service.

Furlough? They were at primary school.

Using the estimates Malcolm posted earlier (Royal Commission etc), if this policy were ever implemented, it wouldn't be for at least six years so the first cohort are currently twelve. Today's eighteen year olds would be in the clear.

I was thinking it could start a bit earlier- 2028, somthing like that. They'd not get away with taking 6 years to do a very prominent campaign promise. So that would make them about 11 when furlough happened, for which apparently kids need to pay a debt (?!) hence at primary school.

Youngian wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 4:11 pm We’ve reached peak Tory, a former army colonel who now writes in the Telegraph about the need for ungrateful young layabouts to do national service.

Listen up Rupert de hyphenated twatt.

Furlough wasn't paid to 14 year olds.