Stop voting for fucking Tories

[shaggy]

Brexit is the yardstick - Britain has a large civil service and diplomatic corps that got completely overwhelmed by leaving a 40 year union, leaving a 300 year old one (that is much deeper) without most of that will sink the Scottish Government for at least a decade.
Not to mention that the SNP are perfectly capable of spinning fantasies up there with any Redwood or Baker - see the constant hedging on currency and the laughable suggestion that the rUK government will pay pensions.

Not to diminish the size of the tasks (both real and potential), but you seem to be absolving the Tories of their role in the clusterfuck and blaming it instead on the task just being too big a one to achieve/ the civil service. They've had no clear direction from incompetent leadership - the most competent and best served civil servants in the world would fail at organising a piss up in a brewery under those conditions.

While the SNP are no doubt capable of their own incompetencies, I refuse to believe they could come anywhere close to the scale of this generation of Tories (plenty of rational Tories in the past, and I'm sure present, they have just lost control of the party)!

As for pensions, while it will no doubt be another political football, I really don't see it as being the major obstacle that others do. My mother hasn't worked in the UK since the late 60's and yet still receives a very small portion of a UK pension every month. You get paid out of the pot you paid into, inevitably many people will end up being paid from two different pension pots, though not a full share from either, but so be it.

Is this not down to the fact the state pension is unfunded and is debt. Any ‘split’ of assets and debts would likely factor in this cost and thus accountability for pensions would also be split accordingly?

[dpedin]

I thought Truss was going to burst into tears after the 4th question and that's why she had to run out of the room. I suspect she might be having a breakdown of some sorts behind the scenes.

The 9 mins of press conference has done nothing to help her position and indeed will have made things much much worse. She is toast and has been since the 'not a budget' budget. Strong rumours that the men in grey suits are going to talk to her this weekend or next week. The reality is the Tories are completely boxed in now - keep Truss and polls plummet even further, they lose election and markets will crash further, get rid of her and they either run another leadership election which the public will hate and want them out or else create some form of 'unity cabinet' and the Tory membership cry foul and then almost everyone will want a general election.

I wouldn't be surprised if they get rid of Truss, have an interim leadership around Mordaunt and Sunak and soon thereafter call a General election on the basis that Labour will then inherit the complete shitshow that they have created and the Tories then try and regroup for next election and cleanse themselves of the far right, dark money funded 'Think Tanks' that have hijacked the Conservative Party. I could see the Tory Party disintegrating at that point with the right wing Brexiteer nutters looking to Farage et al to recreate some version of UKIP, buoyed on by the apparent success of right wing parties elsewhere ie Italy.

Whatever the Tories do now they are completely fecked.

[fishfoodie]

There seems to be a common theme to tweets from all the political correspondents; the Tory MPs are all saying that the Press Conference made things worse.

[_Os_]

I thought Truss was going to burst into tears after the 4th question and that's why she had to run out of the room. I suspect she might be having a breakdown of some sorts behind the scenes.

The 9 mins of press conference has done nothing to help her position and indeed will have made things much much worse. She is toast and has been since the 'not a budget' budget. Strong rumours that the men in grey suits are going to talk to her this weekend or next week. The reality is the Tories are completely boxed in now - keep Truss and polls plummet even further, they lose election and markets will crash further, get rid of her and they either run another leadership election which the public will hate and want them out or else create some form of 'unity cabinet' and the Tory membership cry foul and then almost everyone will want a general election.

I wouldn't be surprised if they get rid of Truss, have an interim leadership around Mordaunt and Sunak and soon thereafter call a General election on the basis that Labour will then inherit the complete shitshow that they have created and the Tories then try and regroup for next election and cleanse themselves of the far right, dark money funded 'Think Tanks' that have hijacked the Conservative Party. I could see the Tory Party disintegrating at that point with the right wing Brexiteer nutters looking to Farage et al to recreate some version of UKIP, buoyed on by the apparent success of right wing parties elsewhere ie Italy.

Whatever the Tories do now they are completely fecked.

As things stand right now they have a core vote of 30%-35% that they could potentially regain before an election if their entire leadership is changed, and that's enforced on their membership against their will. Of that 30%-35%, they've lost 15% since the Kamikwazi budget, so around half their core support is based on economic self interest. Leaving them 20% of the UK electorate that will vote for them no matter what, so they're not going anywhere for awhile yet.

I do think they have massive problems long term though. Among those aged under 50 they're polling under 10%. It's not really true people reach a certain age when they're old and automatically back the Tories, there has to be some reason and the Tories haven't generated one. People's political views tend to lock in around their 30s and never change much after that, the Tories will have spent a decade and half not giving an entire generation affordable housing. So if Labour did get in for sometime the Tories will find themselves trying to win new younger voters just to replace their current voters who are dying. Almost their entire current IEA/Brexit/far right agenda will have to go in the bin, it's all massively out of step with the voters they'll need to win. Very few of the current Tory politicians will be able to play any role, because no one still alive will like those politicians much.

[Tichtheid]

[Torquemada 1420]

I wouldn't be surprised if they get rid of Truss, have an interim leadership around Mordaunt and Sunak and soon thereafter call a General election on the basis that Labour will then inherit the complete shitshow that they have created and the Tories then try and regroup for next election and cleanse themselves of the far right, dark money funded 'Think Tanks' that have hijacked the Conservative Party.

Which is what any smart Machiavellian would do. But the Tories will be caught between evil and greed. The greed being they all want to line their pockets as fast as possible. And so, 5 years might just be too long for reason.

[Hal Jordan]

I've seen a comparison for the press conference performance of Sam Beckett leaping into a new body at the end of a Quantum Leap episode.

[tabascoboy]

I thought Truss was going to burst into tears after the 4th question and that's why she had to run out of the room. I suspect she might be having a breakdown of some sorts behind the scenes.

The 9 mins of press conference has done nothing to help her position and indeed will have made things much much worse. She is toast and has been since the 'not a budget' budget. Strong rumours that the men in grey suits are going to talk to her this weekend or next week. The reality is the Tories are completely boxed in now - keep Truss and polls plummet even further, they lose election and markets will crash further, get rid of her and they either run another leadership election which the public will hate and want them out or else create some form of 'unity cabinet' and the Tory membership cry foul and then almost everyone will want a general election.

I wouldn't be surprised if they get rid of Truss, have an interim leadership around Mordaunt and Sunak and soon thereafter call a General election on the basis that Labour will then inherit the complete shitshow that they have created and the Tories then try and regroup for next election and cleanse themselves of the far right, dark money funded 'Think Tanks' that have hijacked the Conservative Party. I could see the Tory Party disintegrating at that point with the right wing Brexiteer nutters looking to Farage et al to recreate some version of UKIP, buoyed on by the apparent success of right wing parties elsewhere ie Italy.

Whatever the Tories do now they are completely fecked.

Quite honestly, a mild breakdown followed by a resignation from politics "for health reasons" would be the most dignified way out for her now.

[Insane_Homer]

[TB63]

[fishfoodie]

I didn't know called into phone in shows ?, or is it Mick,or one of the other disciples

[Paddington Bear]

Brexit is the yardstick - Britain has a large civil service and diplomatic corps that got completely overwhelmed by leaving a 40 year union, leaving a 300 year old one (that is much deeper) without most of that will sink the Scottish Government for at least a decade.
Not to mention that the SNP are perfectly capable of spinning fantasies up there with any Redwood or Baker - see the constant hedging on currency and the laughable suggestion that the rUK government will pay pensions.

Not to diminish the size of the tasks (both real and potential), but you seem to be absolving the Tories of their role in the clusterfuck and blaming it instead on the task just being too big a one to achieve/ the civil service. They've had no clear direction from incompetent leadership - the most competent and best served civil servants in the world would fail at organising a piss up in a brewery under those conditions.

While the SNP are no doubt capable of their own incompetencies, I refuse to believe they could come anywhere close to the scale of this generation of Tories (plenty of rational Tories in the past, and I'm sure present, they have just lost control of the party)!

As for pensions, while it will no doubt be another political football, I really don't see it as being the major obstacle that others do. My mother hasn't worked in the UK since the late 60's and yet still receives a very small portion of a UK pension every month. You get paid out of the pot you paid into, inevitably many people will end up being paid from two different pension pots, though not a full share from either, but so be it.

No I'm not - I'm pointing out exiting unions is a colossal task that proved beyond not only the Tory Party (clearly) but also the British civil service which encompasses a pretty well respected diplomatic corps. Lack of political leadership didn't help but I'm not convinced it would have mattered - political imperatives demanded a reasonably swift exit and that became uncontrollable. Such imperatives would also exist for the SNP.
The moral of the story is that even a very well organised SNP and Scottish civil service would find themselves choked by it in the medium term, and as others can allude to better than I the SNP lacks depth below the top and is perfectly adept at engaging in nationalist flights of fancy as much as the Tory party.

Pensions is just one example and not meant to be exhaustive, but to pick up on it there is no 'pot' and they are funded out of current tax revenues, reason #1 this would be a shitfight of epic proportions.
The wider point being that the Brexit negotiations were just a taste of how complex it could get - breaking up the UK would likely involve tortuous and fairly emotional debates around citizenship, there's at least a couple of Scots on this bored and at least half their starting XV who may on paper be more likely eligible for English citizenship

[PCPhil]

Hilarious how she went for the Torygraph and Scum for first questions and even they told her to go.

[JM2K6]

[Lobby]

Gilts we’re doing OK today, until Truss’s presser, at which point they shot up:

“The 10-year gilt yield, having fallen as low as 3.899% in early trade, was on track to close at 4.33%, up 13 basis points on the day - a huge intraday swing.”

Every time the Cretin opens her mouth, the UK’s economic position worsens. At this rate, unless the Tories defenestrate her by next week, we’ll end with an economy like Venezuela’s

[sturginho]

[fishfoodie]

Deeply, deeply, undemocratic, & showing a total contempt for the British public, so entirely possible

[PornDog]

No I'm not - I'm pointing out exiting unions is a colossal task that proved beyond not only the Tory Party (clearly) but also the British civil service which encompasses a pretty well respected diplomatic corps. Lack of political leadership didn't help but I'm not convinced it would have mattered - political imperatives demanded a reasonably swift exit and that became uncontrollable. Such imperatives would also exist for the SNP.
The moral of the story is that even a very well organised SNP and Scottish civil service would find themselves choked by it in the medium term, and as others can allude to better than I the SNP lacks depth below the top and is perfectly adept at engaging in nationalist flights of fancy as much as the Tory party.

Pensions is just one example and not meant to be exhaustive, but to pick up on it there is no 'pot' and they are funded out of current tax revenues, reason #1 this would be a shitfight of epic proportions.
The wider point being that the Brexit negotiations were just a taste of how complex it could get - breaking up the UK would likely involve tortuous and fairly emotional debates around citizenship, there's at least a couple of Scots on this bored and at least half their starting XV who may on paper be more likely eligible for English citizenship

I don't massively disagree with your overall sentiment - exiting the EU was/is a colossal task, much as it would be for Scotland to exit the UK. However I strongly disagree with regard to the degree Tory incompetence has contributed to the scale of the task. How civil servants are supposed to go about achieving goals when the goals themselves either haven't been defined, are actively being undermined through backslapping corruption, or so fanciful in the extreme as them being completely and utterly pointless, I do not know.

Competent leadership, starting with Cameron having an actual fucking plan before the referendum (beyond simply tossing a coin in the air and hoping it would turn up his way) for what the next steps would be. I have no doubt that competent leadership would have had a signed, sealed and delivered (and most importantly accommodated) Brexit years ago. Instead it is an ever ongoing shit show.

Again I understand there isn't a 'pot' per se for pensions, but the principal is the same, its just a matter of working out the formula. While there is plenty of scope for arguing over the minutia (okay that's maybe under playing it slightly), the broad strokes of those principals don't leave much room for complete roughshodding. This does of course require reasonable and fair dealing on both sides, which maybe a lack of faith in is where you're coming from.

[petej]

No I'm not - I'm pointing out exiting unions is a colossal task that proved beyond not only the Tory Party (clearly) but also the British civil service which encompasses a pretty well respected diplomatic corps. Lack of political leadership didn't help but I'm not convinced it would have mattered - political imperatives demanded a reasonably swift exit and that became uncontrollable. Such imperatives would also exist for the SNP.
The moral of the story is that even a very well organised SNP and Scottish civil service would find themselves choked by it in the medium term, and as others can allude to better than I the SNP lacks depth below the top and is perfectly adept at engaging in nationalist flights of fancy as much as the Tory party.

Pensions is just one example and not meant to be exhaustive, but to pick up on it there is no 'pot' and they are funded out of current tax revenues, reason #1 this would be a shitfight of epic proportions.
The wider point being that the Brexit negotiations were just a taste of how complex it could get - breaking up the UK would likely involve tortuous and fairly emotional debates around citizenship, there's at least a couple of Scots on this bored and at least half their starting XV who may on paper be more likely eligible for English citizenship

I don't massively disagree with your overall sentiment - exiting the EU was/is a colossal task, much as it would be for Scotland to exit the UK. However I strongly disagree with regard to the degree Tory incompetence has contributed to the scale of the task. How civil servants are supposed to go about achieving goals when the goals themselves either haven't been defined, are actively being undermined through backslapping corruption, or so fanciful in the extreme as them being completely and utterly pointless, I do not know.

Competent leadership, starting with Cameron having an actual fucking plan before the referendum (beyond simply tossing a coin in the air and hoping it would turn up his way) for what the next steps would be. I have no doubt that competent leadership would have had a signed, sealed and delivered (and most importantly accommodated) Brexit years ago. Instead it is an ever ongoing shit show.

Again I understand there isn't a 'pot' per se for pensions, but the principal is the same, its just a matter of working out the formula. While there is plenty of scope for arguing over the minutia (okay that's maybe under playing it slightly), the broad strokes of those principals don't leave much room for complete roughshodding. This does of course require reasonable and fair dealing on both sides, which maybe a lack of faith in is where you're coming from.

I would also point out the SNP have a very clear aim in how they want to align themselves by wanting to be in the EU this gives very clear known requirements and targets. With brexit fuck knows what they want even at this stage when the hse have put out requests in materials the input they will get back (mostly align with the EU) will be exactly what the government don't want. A civil servant friend who was wanted to work on brexit said that it was like dealing with ostriches who had buried their heads in reinforced concrete.

[Torquemada 1420]

Every time the Cretin opens her mouth, the UK’s economic position worsens. At this rate, unless the Tories defenestrate her by next week, we’ll end with an economy like Venezuela’s

Minus the oil to bail the UK out.

What odds it'll be back at 5% on Monday and then we'll see in Bailey has to resign if the BofE back tracks too = both the Government and the central bank look like asses.

[Insane_Homer]

[tabascoboy]

[Biffer]

Pretty good piece about what this means in the wider Co text and where it came from.

Although many of us saw this coming way back before 2016

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... dApp_Other

[dpedin]

Pretty good piece about what this means in the wider Co text and where it came from.

Although many of us saw this coming way back before 2016

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... dApp_Other

Agreed it was obvious that Brexit was a disastrous policy - economically, politically and socially - driven by jingoism, xenophobia and racism fed by UKIP/Tory Government and right wing media. It was also primarily an English phenomena mirroring the 'Little Englander' view of the world involving England winning two world wars single handedly and having run the world for 100's of years. It was inevitable that it would lead to weaker economy, lower growth, shrinking workforce, etc. But hey ho we got 'Sovrenti' back ... only the stupid planks who voted to leave ever thought we had lost it! The Tory party has destroyed itself trying to demonstrate it was a 'good thing' and have had to lurch further and further right in order to protect this illusion. Unfortunately they have destroyed the country in the process. What a feckin shitshow of crap promoted and defended by utter tossers.

[Slick]

Pretty good piece about what this means in the wider Co text and where it came from.

Although many of us saw this coming way back before 2016

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... dApp_Other

Agreed it was obvious that Brexit was a disastrous policy - economically, politically and socially - driven by jingoism, xenophobia and racism fed by UKIP/Tory Government and right wing media. It was also primarily an English phenomena mirroring the 'Little Englander' view of the world involving England winning two world wars single handedly and having run the world for 100's of years. It was inevitable that it would lead to weaker economy, lower growth, shrinking workforce, etc. But hey ho we got 'Sovrenti' back ... only the stupid planks who voted to leave ever thought we had lost it! The Tory party has destroyed itself trying to demonstrate it was a 'good thing' and have had to lurch further and further right in order to protect this illusion. Unfortunately they have destroyed the country in the process. What a feckin shitshow of crap promoted and defended by utter tossers.

Swap a few names around and it sounds like something very familiar

[tabascoboy]

[fishfoodie]

Fucking hell. That's a appalling idea

Is she going to let people self-prescribe painkillers too ?

[PornDog]

Wow, that is colossally fucking stupid!

[tabascoboy]

Good grief, has the Torygraph been taken over today?! Strange to see this comment headline in there of all places

Project Fear was right all along
Six years of policy confusion and ineptitude has brought a calamitous loss of standing

Call it revenge of the Remainer Establishment, if you like. The revolution in the British economy promised by Leave campaigners six years ago finally seemed to go the way of all revolutionary movements this week: it ended up eating itself.

Downbeat predictions by the Treasury and others on the economic consequences of leaving the EU, contemptuously dismissed at the time by Brexit campaigners as "Project Fear", have been on a long fuse, but they have turned out to be overwhelmingly correct, and if anything have underestimated both the calamitous loss of international standing and the scale of the damage that six years of policy confusion and ineptitude has imposed on the country. A serious house price correction, substantially higher interest rates and a permanently impaired exchange rate may be the least of it.

Credibility is all in politics, finance and economics; this week was the point at which the UK Government finally managed to lose all last remaining vestiges of it. Britain's trusted institutional framework, together with its hard won reputation for sound money and certainty in policy, all went down the pan. Perhaps I exaggerate, but not since the humiliation of the International Monetary Fund bailout in 1976 have we seen an unravelling quite as spectacular. This too from a Tory Government with a substantial overall majority. It is scarcely believable.

These are dark days for Tory MPs, who will be acutely aware that loss of reputation for economic competence is electoral poison for their party. As the former Chancellor, Philip Hammond, has already observed, that reputation has been comprehensively trashed by what's just occurred.

I feel sorry for Kwasi Kwarteng. He now bears the dubious distinction of being Britain's second shortest serving Chancellor ever after Ian Macleod, who died in office almost immediately after being appointed.

Others have been chasing the silver medal hard in the turmoil of the last several years; Sajid Javid lasted just six months, and Nadhim Zahawi only eight weeks. Anyone would think we had become Italy or Greece, such is the turnover in key government positions and the growing sense of political, economic and fiscal instability.

Nor is the storm by any means yet over. Stripped of all authority and credibility, it is hard to see how Liz Truss, the Prime Minister, can survive the traumas of the past several weeks. As Norman Lamont said of John Major, she's in office but not in power.

The U-turn on corporation tax, the scapegoating of Kwarteng, and his replacement with the supposedly steadying hand of Jeremy Hunt is unlikely to save her. The cut in spending plans that she implied on Friday may be what the markets demand, but politically it threatens finally to destroy her.

Kwarteng was a likeable Chancellor with many of the right intentions. He is not wrong about the need for radical action to correct multiple long term weaknesses and deficiencies in the UK economy. Many of the supply side measures announced in the mini-Budget were more than welcome, and might in time have made a significant difference to the UK's long term growth trajectory.

Yet the unfunded tax cuts were always going to be a bridge too far. Fiscal policy 101: you do not attempt to do a permanent fiscal giveaway against the backdrop of sharply rising inflation and interest rates, a punishing energy crisis, a current account deficit swollen to an unprecedented 8 percent of GDP, and a seemingly intractable black hole at the heart of the public finances. To have rejected independent assessment of the plans by the Office for Budget Responsibility only further added to the sense of alarm in financial markets.

When we talk about "financial markets", it is important to note that they are not some god-like arbiter of policy whose judgement on matters is beyond challenge, but essentially just a lot of excitable children who, with herd-like conformity, are merely chasing the money.

The idea that the £18bn a year of corporation tax revenues that seemed to be at the centre of this week's rout would make the difference between national solvency and insolvency is almost beyond ridiculous. It would not have done. Yet sadly it became totemic in a wider loss of political and economic credibility, which has been cumulative now over a number of years.

It is perhaps not so surprising that the passionate Remainer who became a passionate Brexiteer should choose to throw her Chancellor to the wolves in order to save her own skin. Yet the fact is that Truss was in lockstep with Kwarteng in challenging "economic orthodoxy" and the institutions that were its standard bearers. On the campaign trail she was, if anything, even more of a zealot for economic radicalism than Kwarteng. In any case, she plainly didn't understand the sometimes destructive way markets interact with policy. It's been a rude awakening.

In the end, it was Andrew Bailey, Governor of the Bank of England, who brought matters to a head, by insisting that there would be no extension to the bond buying programme he had initiated to counter forced selling by UK pension funds.

This has been widely portrayed as another foot in mouth episode by a Governor with something of a reputation for gaffes. Having failed, despite all the warning signs, to see the surge in inflation coming, the Bank fully deserves whatever criticism is thrown at it. The Bank has failed to conduct itself well in recent times.

Even so, the Governor had little option but to say what he did. It makes no sense at all for a central bank, which is supposed to be tightening policy to fight inflation, to be simultaneously loosening it through resumed asset purchases.

To do so would be seen by "Mr Market" as monetary financing, or what is sometimes referred to as "fiscal dominance", where monetary policy is used to support the government's fiscal needs. By making the programme time-limited, the Bank was able just about to pass its intervention off as justified on financial stability grounds. It would have been game over had Bailey made the programme open ended. Already, acute loss of credibility in monetary policy would have spiralled out of control, and the rout in bond markets would have gotten even worse.

Once the Bank had made clear that it would be ending the programme as scheduled, the Government had no option but to reverse its fiscal plans. It would have been mayhem in the markets on Monday had it not done so.

"Economic orthodoxy" is back in the saddle. But then it never really went away. Instead we had a brief aberration in which the Government, having dispensed with all sensible advice, thought bizarrely that it could defy gravity. If it had been done differently it might have succeeded, but it was not. We'll be paying the consequences in reduced standing and prosperity for years, if not decades, to come.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/20 ... ght-along/

[Torquemada 1420]

Good grief, has the Torygraph been taken over today?! Strange to see this comment headline in there of all places

Project Fear was right all along
Six years of policy confusion and ineptitude has brought a calamitous loss of standing

Call it revenge of the Remainer Establishment, if you like. The revolution in the British economy promised by Leave campaigners six years ago finally seemed to go the way of all revolutionary movements this week: it ended up eating itself.

Downbeat predictions by the Treasury and others on the economic consequences of leaving the EU, contemptuously dismissed at the time by Brexit campaigners as "Project Fear", have been on a long fuse, but they have turned out to be overwhelmingly correct, and if anything have underestimated both the calamitous loss of international standing and the scale of the damage that six years of policy confusion and ineptitude has imposed on the country. A serious house price correction, substantially higher interest rates and a permanently impaired exchange rate may be the least of it.

Credibility is all in politics, finance and economics; this week was the point at which the UK Government finally managed to lose all last remaining vestiges of it. Britain's trusted institutional framework, together with its hard won reputation for sound money and certainty in policy, all went down the pan. Perhaps I exaggerate, but not since the humiliation of the International Monetary Fund bailout in 1976 have we seen an unravelling quite as spectacular. This too from a Tory Government with a substantial overall majority. It is scarcely believable.

These are dark days for Tory MPs, who will be acutely aware that loss of reputation for economic competence is electoral poison for their party. As the former Chancellor, Philip Hammond, has already observed, that reputation has been comprehensively trashed by what's just occurred.

I feel sorry for Kwasi Kwarteng. He now bears the dubious distinction of being Britain's second shortest serving Chancellor ever after Ian Macleod, who died in office almost immediately after being appointed.

Others have been chasing the silver medal hard in the turmoil of the last several years; Sajid Javid lasted just six months, and Nadhim Zahawi only eight weeks. Anyone would think we had become Italy or Greece, such is the turnover in key government positions and the growing sense of political, economic and fiscal instability.

Nor is the storm by any means yet over. Stripped of all authority and credibility, it is hard to see how Liz Truss, the Prime Minister, can survive the traumas of the past several weeks. As Norman Lamont said of John Major, she's in office but not in power.

The U-turn on corporation tax, the scapegoating of Kwarteng, and his replacement with the supposedly steadying hand of Jeremy Hunt is unlikely to save her. The cut in spending plans that she implied on Friday may be what the markets demand, but politically it threatens finally to destroy her.

Kwarteng was a likeable Chancellor with many of the right intentions. He is not wrong about the need for radical action to correct multiple long term weaknesses and deficiencies in the UK economy. Many of the supply side measures announced in the mini-Budget were more than welcome, and might in time have made a significant difference to the UK's long term growth trajectory.

Yet the unfunded tax cuts were always going to be a bridge too far. Fiscal policy 101: you do not attempt to do a permanent fiscal giveaway against the backdrop of sharply rising inflation and interest rates, a punishing energy crisis, a current account deficit swollen to an unprecedented 8 percent of GDP, and a seemingly intractable black hole at the heart of the public finances. To have rejected independent assessment of the plans by the Office for Budget Responsibility only further added to the sense of alarm in financial markets.

When we talk about "financial markets", it is important to note that they are not some god-like arbiter of policy whose judgement on matters is beyond challenge, but essentially just a lot of excitable children who, with herd-like conformity, are merely chasing the money.

The idea that the £18bn a year of corporation tax revenues that seemed to be at the centre of this week's rout would make the difference between national solvency and insolvency is almost beyond ridiculous. It would not have done. Yet sadly it became totemic in a wider loss of political and economic credibility, which has been cumulative now over a number of years.

It is perhaps not so surprising that the passionate Remainer who became a passionate Brexiteer should choose to throw her Chancellor to the wolves in order to save her own skin. Yet the fact is that Truss was in lockstep with Kwarteng in challenging "economic orthodoxy" and the institutions that were its standard bearers. On the campaign trail she was, if anything, even more of a zealot for economic radicalism than Kwarteng. In any case, she plainly didn't understand the sometimes destructive way markets interact with policy. It's been a rude awakening.

In the end, it was Andrew Bailey, Governor of the Bank of England, who brought matters to a head, by insisting that there would be no extension to the bond buying programme he had initiated to counter forced selling by UK pension funds.

This has been widely portrayed as another foot in mouth episode by a Governor with something of a reputation for gaffes. Having failed, despite all the warning signs, to see the surge in inflation coming, the Bank fully deserves whatever criticism is thrown at it. The Bank has failed to conduct itself well in recent times.

Even so, the Governor had little option but to say what he did. It makes no sense at all for a central bank, which is supposed to be tightening policy to fight inflation, to be simultaneously loosening it through resumed asset purchases.

To do so would be seen by "Mr Market" as monetary financing, or what is sometimes referred to as "fiscal dominance", where monetary policy is used to support the government's fiscal needs. By making the programme time-limited, the Bank was able just about to pass its intervention off as justified on financial stability grounds. It would have been game over had Bailey made the programme open ended. Already, acute loss of credibility in monetary policy would have spiralled out of control, and the rout in bond markets would have gotten even worse.

Once the Bank had made clear that it would be ending the programme as scheduled, the Government had no option but to reverse its fiscal plans. It would have been mayhem in the markets on Monday had it not done so.

"Economic orthodoxy" is back in the saddle. But then it never really went away. Instead we had a brief aberration in which the Government, having dispensed with all sensible advice, thought bizarrely that it could defy gravity. If it had been done differently it might have succeeded, but it was not. We'll be paying the consequences in reduced standing and prosperity for years, if not decades, to come.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/20 ... ght-along/

This ain't over yet. Every possibility that gilt coupons pass 5% early next week and if that happens, we'll see if the BofE holds Bailey's line and potentially some FS schemes go to the wall OR Bailey and the BofE lose almost as much credibility for back tracking as Truss.

[_Os_]

Jeremy Warner is the author of that article, he's the one sane voice left in the Telegraph, which is a Tory alternate reality hellhole otherwise. He'll go the same way as Oborne (who quit the Telegraph in 2015 claiming its journalism was controlled by commercial considerations) if he keeps this up, those who fund the Telegraph do not want reality intruding too much. Evans-Pritchard has also made negative noises about Brexit, but nothing like Warner.

[_Os_]

Pretty good piece about what this means in the wider Co text and where it came from.

Although many of us saw this coming way back before 2016

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... dApp_Other

Good article, but it's going to be another 5 to 10 years before it's properly over. These people are deep in an alternate reality, which makes Labour scared to act because they want those votes too. Polling is showing large majorities now think Brexit is bad, but that hasn't translated into much change in the polling for re-join/closer relationship with the EU. You'll know it's over when the tabloids are demanding a closer relationship to the EU, tabascoboy's post shows how they operate, they'll push their alternate reality Tory bullshit when there's an open door/people are undecided, but once the mood changes decisively they just go with it.

Another example of the alternate reality today. Banks thinks Truss is calmly in control and knows what she is doing, and Hunt is the insane madman (supported remain and didn't recant enough) that has no control and is being used as a human shield by Truss. The reality is roughly the opposite, Hunt has much more power than someone installed in different circumstances would have, Truss depends on him for credibility and if he can't deliver it she has nothing. This cartoonist is popular in the anti-vax alternate reality, and pro-Putin alternate reality, and sometimes dips into the Tory alternate reality.

[C69]

Let's not forget, Hunt by his own admission was put of his depth at Health and acknowledged he made loads of mistakes
Mistakes he was told of time and time again during his tenure but he denied he was on the wrong trak.
I suspect he may suggest merging Health and Social care like he has championed, well he will of he has any balls.
He is now the defacto PM.

If it was up to he would cut Corporation tax to 15% not have it at 25%. He is an arrogant toss pot parachute d on to try an unite. He is an intellectual pygmy dripping with arrogance.

[sefton]

So next a U-Turn on the 1p income tax reduction. The shameless bitch will still try to hold on.

[Ovals]

So next a U-Turn on the 1p income tax reduction. The shameless bitch will still try to hold on.

The Tories are so divided they can't agree on a suitable replacement - another party election would tear them apart and they'd still end up with someone they don't want. She'll survive for now, no matter what happens - but she's little more than a hostage from now on.

[_Os_]

Looks like Biden knew about the UK budget in advance and his tweet about trickle down economics was aimed squarely at Truss! Can't see how the UK gets any real growth now having pissed off the EU and the US!

PS However I expect Scotlands golf courses to be full of rich Americans next year splashing the cash as the £1 = $1. Might have to find a wee part time job doing some caddying? Tips should be bigger?

It takes a fairly embarrassing level of cultural cringe to seriously believe Biden is subtweeting about British domestic politics

Let's not pretend what's happening here isn't big news in the USA.

There's been some credible off the record reports from US journos, that Biden and his team regard Truss as a moron and are quite happy to openly say it. The elderly Irishman isn't sub tweeting anymore (if he was), he's just saying it matter of fact whilst ordering ice cream and being filmed.

[SaintK]

[PCPhil]

Any sign of her since she ran off the stage and started crying?

Best thing to do is get straight back on the horse. Another press conf on Monday would be fun.

[fishfoodie]

Maybe the men in grey suits would be better off visiting the editor of Vogue, & convincing them to put Dizzy on the cover; "In the National Interest", as that would probably mark a successful Leadership as far as she's concerned ?

[dpedin]

Tories are blocked in with no obvious route out, only ones that are quick and nasty or ones that prolong the agony and then turn nasty! I don't think Truss will front up at PMQs on Wednesday, I suspect she is having a minor panic attack/breakdown and will either find a way out of PMQs or will resign before then. She is too unstable and incapable of doing PMQs now and the Tories know it. Markets on Monday might push Tories into action but I suspect the men on grey suits will want to do something asap before the damage is made even worse.

I think we are in unprecedented times here with a PM who is visibly unable to lead and who is now psychologically unwell. They might try and force her to step down on medical grounds and get some interim arrangement in place but even that is going to be difficult/impossible given the infighting and division within the party. Worse scenario for them, and for my pension pot, is that they become paralysed with no agreement on how to go forward and just let things drift and deteriorate!