General Election - 4th July 2024

Why can't she air her political views? she has as much right to publicly support any party as anyone else does

It's okay to fundraise. You can even unsubscribe to specifically those emails.

The parties may be employing a leaflet delivery firm, which means they come together - possibly with a pizza flyer. That happened to me yesterday.

I think for general elections all parties are entitled to one free delivery by Royal Mail too, but if a party isn't targeting your area they may not bother as they still have to pay for the printing of the leaflets.

My postal vote has arrived, so I've had a bit of fun Googling the candidates. One of them is a massive anti-vaxxer for the "Sovereignty" party whose campaign suggests either I have to choose between Change and Chains. Her address is on the ballot paper (everyone else had the sense to have note the constituency they live in) and I see she lives near me. If it's the person I'm thinking of she was all over local social media during lockdown doing out of tune song and dance routines about Coronavirus being a hoax.   

On Election Map the Libs have picked up 4 more seats - which now includes Runnymeade and Weybridge. 

electionmaps.uk/nowcast

Roll on Thursday.

Nice treat for the incoming government next week

To sort out the junior doctors pay deal

Let’s see how successful they are

With a planned budget increase for the NHS amounting to a real terms cut

Yet a delusion to offer more appointments and surgery at the weekend

No doubt from staff who are not qualified as doctors

Let’s see how much further damage labour can do in the next 4 years

They can't do as damage to the country as the Torries

Putting the brakes on the pilfering and reckless harm done to the country by the current administration will be a start. So much of the damage has been at a structural level and fixing it won't lead to visible results any time soon, and I think most sensible people understand that.

Of course there will be people campaigning that their cause is prioritised, and I those who aren't fans of Starmer (Tories and parts of the Labour party alike) that have resigned themselves to the likely result are already trying to create an environment whereby not fixing things in the first few months will be seen as a failure. But whether or not people voting Labour are realistic about the timeline for change, they will have time before the next general election. I fully expect things to stay fairly rubbish for a while.

A big part of the problem with the doctors strikes has been the current government's unwillingness to get around the table. It seems they are deliberately misrepresenting concerns and goading NHS staff into striking so they can complain about the unions and staff in tv interviews. I don't think issues around staff and pay in the NHS will be resolved any time soon - if ever. And that's only one of many things in the NHS that needs attention. But I am hopeful that further strikes can be avoided for the time-being if the government of the day shows willingness to listen, commit to some interim improvements while acknowledging it's not the 'final offer' and isn't trying to use negotiations to undermine the whole ethos of the NHS.

Budgets will increase pretty quickly. I do accept money will come from growth - including home building - although it's unclear where the huge workforce will come from. And the shape of wealth taxes will be interesting. You have to assume CGT but there might be novel add-ons around that.

I'm not sure if it's possible now, but I'd like to have seen some kind of windfall tax on the massive and disproportionate profits made by some organisations during the pandemic. No doubt most of it has been moved around with the help of expensive accountants and is now sitting in off-shore bank accounts. But in an ideal world I'd have ring-fenced any income from that to be allocated to businesses that took a big hit because of the need to lockdown, in particular live entertainment venues including theatres.

It's difficult to really believe the Conservatives will go below 100 seats but with declarations like this ..

x.com/PippaCrerar/status/1807203016120107039

Looking at the available candidates in my area, I am genuinely at a loss as to who to vote for. A combination of proven useless (the current Labour incumbent who has done nothing for our area in nearly two decades), actively awful (the Reform candidate and a random independent who appears to have no other goal than banning abortion) and nice-but-unconvincing (the local Lib Dem and Green candidates, who seem pleasant and well meaning but that's about it). And of course the Conservative candidate who in our area will never win and is so bland you'd forget he was there.

Anyone else got such a positively dismal set of choices?