[Andy McDandy]

The Hutton enquiry was similar - lots of juicy revelations and a sense of "no way can they get away with this", but then the actual verdict was quite mild on the government. Not that it mattered as everyone had made up their minds anyway.

I think Satnav has nailed it - they didn't expect it to be quite so soon, although other countries (notably Sweden) have completed theirs already. I suppose that the nature of the enquiry - fact finding or blame-laying - will play a part too.

I suspect that anything truly illegal or blatantly corrupt will be safely concealed at the most crucial points (and such broad questions as "wasn't it a bit coincident that all these people with access to high level Tories had these paper companies just sitting around waiting to be activated?" are easily deflected by lawyers). Besides, I don't know. Maybe that's what rich people do, just create shell companies with bland meaningless names just in case they ever need one in a pinch. As said elsewhere, just looking dodgy isn't yet an offence. If it was, Michelle Mone would be on E wing by now.

Seriously, look up her Wiki entry. She makes Chris the Crafty Cockney look legit.

[Bones McCoy]

The Hutton enquiry was similar - lots of juicy revelations and a sense of "no way can they get away with this", but then the actual verdict was quite mild on the government. Not that it mattered as everyone had made up their minds anyway.

I think Satnav has nailed it - they didn't expect it to be quite so soon, although other countries (notably Sweden) have completed theirs already. I suppose that the nature of the enquiry - fact finding or blame-laying - will play a part too.

I suspect that anything truly illegal or blatantly corrupt will be safely concealed at the most crucial points (and such broad questions as "wasn't it a bit coincident that all these people with access to high level Tories had these paper companies just sitting around waiting to be activated?" are easily deflected by lawyers). Besides, I don't know. Maybe that's what rich people do, just create shell companies with bland meaningless names just in case they ever need one in a pinch. As said elsewhere, just looking dodgy isn't yet an offence. If it was, Michelle Mone would be on E wing by now.

Seriously, look up her Wiki entry. She makes Chris the Crafty Cockney look legit.

To some extent, it matters little whether laws were broken or not with the VIP lane.
The public have seen Tory connected people - people not like us - making huge profits for little/no effort.
Soon after we were told not to expect our living standards to persist, ad the cost of energy and everyday food went through the roof.

Any tory claiming responsible custody of the economy will now be challenged by "But only after the likes of Baroness Mone have taken their cut".
Other profiteers are possible (Matt Hancock's Pub Landlord).
Voters who previously bought the whole law abiding and good governance stories will have mostly noticed everything going to shit.

In the absence of evidence "why all these enquiries, and why can't we find the evidence" is almost as damning.

Close the discussion by asking where are the 40 new Hospitals, 50,000 new nurses, 6,000 more GPs, 300,000 new homes.
We saw them chant their pledges, but all we got was 10,000 new excuses.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Ha ha ha ha. All famously cheap to build, these styles.

[mattomac]

Can’t move for them in Southport.

[Andy McDandy]

Down by the front, there are loads of houses in those styles. And Southport ain't cheap.

[davidjay]

Going back to A McD's earlier point, it used to be the case that an 'entrepreneur' would always have a few shelf companies knocking around and I would guess that's still the case. After all, you never know when you might need to put some heavy debts into administration and start again.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Civil servants don't have any power to block who ministers meet. But hey, it must be true if Andrea Jenkyns says it.

[Tubby Isaacs]

How shit is this? They weren't "talks", they were a chat on the phone, and Dale Vince revealed that himself so not "secret", unless Greg is proposing to reveal every phone call he's made. The policy on new licences was briefed months ago. Good luck with persuading the public that a renewable electricity entrepreneur is Dr Evil.

What does the second part have to do with the first part? Is Starmer a Just Stop Oil front man or not?

[Tubby Isaacs]

William Hague once had Jim Davidson as a speaker at the main Tory Conference. Less than a year later, the Tories lost Ludlow. I'm sure this effort will provide similar stardust.

[Abernathy]

"Plus Live Entertainment". I do sometimes wonder what happened to the black and white minstrels.


"Venue to be confirmed". Hmmmmmm.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Jim isn't the entertainment? He just sits there eating dinner for his fee?

[Yug]

No, Jim is not the entertainment. Jim stopped being entertaining over 40 years ago. Not that he ever was *that* entertaining in the first place.

[Oboogie]

"Venue to be confirmed". Hmmmmmm.

Ashfield Wetherspoons has a backroom at very reasonable prices.

[Andy McDandy]

Why do I look at that picture and think of Father Ted?

[Bones McCoy]

£50 quid.

They'll have to pay us a lot more than that.

[mattomac]

Down by the front, there are loads of houses in those styles. And Southport ain't cheap.

Less so in Churchtown, Crossens and the areas of town I am more aware of.

Suppose it plays well with the Birkdale vote.

[Bones McCoy]

[Tubby Isaacs]

Heven't heard from this political heavyweight for some time. No surprise to see him pitch in behind Houchen, of course.

Councils have to be able to put there own money in to levelling up schemes, money which has been massively cut for 13 years. Funnily enough, the new administration in Stoke wants to take a look.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Just seen this from Mark in his UKIP days. Given that he defected to the Tories and supported Liz Truss for leader, his views seem to have, er, evolved, once the Brexit votes were in the bag.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Actual Chief Secretary to the Treasury here. Some quotes from the IFS (who've made a fairly general point about the need to watch inflation) but also laughable stuff that Starmer "promised not to get out the big government checkbook". His beef is with "unfunded" green investment- why would you borrow for this, it's a mystery. If he's terrified that this spending would cause spiralling inflation, he can't be that confident in Sunak's professed policy of getting it under control.

Among other zingers is that Reeves needs to rule out borrowing for day to day spending, which of course never happened after 2010.

It's signed in his capacity as Chief Secretary too. Isn't that, well, deeply improper?