Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

Yeah I'm not fully sure on that framing.

First of all there is a change from the first year under this government on this issue to previous years (even if it did hit a high in the last year of Sunak's premiership too):


I think it is right that this is largely because Labour have inherited a prison estate running at 99% capaciy, with outdate IT sytems so prison staff are calculating when someone should be released using the calendars and calculators on their desktops and the early release schemes are complicating those sums. That is exactly the argument David Lammy is making - I'm not sure that he's necessarily making it effectively, but that's his case. I'd just add that Shabana Mahmood's a very lucky general leaving the Ministry of Justice with her reputation enhanced for presiding over the prisons crisis and early release scheme without anything blowing up on her watch. Also the state of actual existing government IT infrastructure is a not insignificant part of why I am dubious about the capacity for the British state to build a digital ID system for anything less than hundreds of billions and many many years.

But on the broader point I often think of a Bagehot article by Duncan Robinson in the Economist a few years ago - just after Mr Bates came out. The basic argument he made was that chances are the next big scandal in British public life is already in the public domain. Most of the big scandals either of the "national scandal" frame or the individual political scandal relies on a lot of information that is already out there - in various statistics, official reports, declarations of earnings or conflicts etc. The thing that happens - and what's happened here - is how do you turn a dry as dust statistical report into a story - what's the line, what's the narrative (beginning, middle, end) or increasingly with fantastic reporting like you get from John Burn-Murdoch or Tom Calver turning the data into something visually arresting that can structure a story. I'd add that government does also do the document dump of releasing so much and trying to bury (perhaps not even noticing) the alarming stuff in the flood of data. There is a lot of noise and it takes either a data journalist, or a story to help identify the signal (incidentally this is where I think AI will actually be very helpful for journalists).

[Tamas]

So have labour replaced prison officers en masse? Or drastically altered rules pertaining to prisoner release? No? Then this isn't their fault. Perhaps wardens and such are less motivated to keep the facade on now that there is no right-wing government to support.

[Sheilbh]

I suppose it depends what you mean by dramatically, but yes the government altered the rules in relation to prisoner release. There was a crisis in summer 2024 immediately after they came into office when we basically ran out of space. Mahmood as Justice Secretary got Treasury funding for new prisons but also had to introduce an early release scheme that in its first year released 40,000 people earlier than they would have been released under the existing scheme. I think basically cutting the time served requirement from 50% to 40% for certain crimes (I think some sexual and violent crimes were excluded). They also commissioned an independent review (inevitably ) into sentencing in general and have accepted most of those recommendations so there is wider reform of sentencing.

Prisons were, with local authorities and the higher education sector going bust, one of the main items on Sue Gray's "shit list" of crises that could imminently explode at any time.

Also you might well be right in your assumption that prison officers are more likely to support a right-wing government. But I'd note that while they're banned from striking it's a heavily unionised sector that has been in various sorts of dispute with the government for a long time over austerity - basically combination of underfunding of prisons, overcrowding and pay freezes making their jobs and lives more difficult and morale hitting rock bottom. (I feel the morale and pay point is part of why in recent years there's been a few scandals of prison officers working for organised crime as well as the weirder trend of prison officers having affairs with inmates). But I don't think they're fucking up deliberately because they don't like the government any more than I think the story last year of the NHS spending more settling materniy care negligence claims than they spend on maternity care is because nurses and doctors were trying to sabotage the Tories.

Again as I say the line from the prison officers union is exactly that this sort of thing has been happening routinely and it's a consequence of underfunding.

I think heading down the path of public servants trying to undermine an elected government because they don't like their politics is not a fruitful path (and one that will vastly benefit the right and forces who want things privatised/outsourced). It's not fake news and it's not the deep state - it's a problem, a state failure and the government are responsible. In my view it's directly caused by austerity, which is an argument you can make but politics isn't a morality play. So the government needs to deal with it as best they can in the short term and make the decisions to increase growth to better fund public services and, in the long run in my view, increase state capacity.

[garbon]

The BBC in shambles?

[Josquius]

The BBC in shambles?

It's bizzaro world stuff. The BBC getting in trouble for not being right wing enough.

But it makes political sense to just accept the orange baby's whines and change the management. Hopefully the new person is careful but shifts the bbc back towards the centre and actual balance.

[Richard Hakluyt]

It was a fairly disgraceful edit, I'm shocked that the BBC aired it.

Not very shocked though, tbe ruling class here seem to have had some sort of nervous collapse...... gross incompetence seems to reign in most areas of public endeavour.

[Sheilbh]

I agree. I think it's the sort of thing I'd expect a trainee to know is unacceptable. The criticisms of coverage of the Tavistock clinic and BBC Arabic also seem fair. Which you'd hope from an independent consultant who thought it would be a confidential report.

Slightly struck by the number of veteran BBC reporters who say they recognise the criticism - as well as those, like John Simpson or Nick Robinson, who don't.

On the ruling class I genuinely think they're like Bourbon supporters or Victorians stranded in the 20th century who are just incapable of comprehending that the world has changed (and that the material basis of their world view basically no longer exists). I fee like The Rest is Politics is possibly the most extreme version of this.

[Razgovory]

It's remarkable that people actually defend this stuff.

[Sheilbh]

Ah good - I perceive that the Labour psychodrama has started again

Reeves and Starmer need to go - urgently (I think Reeves especially is an incredibly inept Chancellor) - but a bit like the promising to be whiter than white in government, I suspect they're probably regretting the "stability is the change" line.

I did genuinely hope though we'd get out of the wild briefing campaigns from around the cabinet table. But Streeting has been making his moves and now, according to Bloomberg, you've got someone in government briefing that ""Number Ten has gone into full bunker mode, turning on their most loyal cabinet members for absolutely no reason. Unfortunately there is a pattern of Keir's team briefing against his own people- they did it to Angela, Lisa, Lucy, now it's Wes's turn. A circular firing squad won't help the government out of the hole we're in." Meanwhile people close to Starmer have said they recently did a wargame with investors and were told that anyone oher than Starmer and Reeves would mean significantly higher borrowing costs and an economic crisis (I think Number 10 already ran this playbook once against Burnham - at a certain point it'll stop working because the markets will be pricing in the change and possibly prefer it to the "stability").

My main thought is that I also think this is incredibly irresponsible from Number 10. A bit like bringing up grooming gangs to attack Burnham - it feels like the sort of line that might make sense in factional party fights when you're in opposition and have no hope of winning but is reckless in government.

Having said all that - I don't like Streeting. If I were him this is probably his best chance/best timing (and he's clearly been making interventions for a leadership bid in the last two months). But I think I'd take Streeting over Starmer right now.

[Tamas]

Streeting? Wes Streeting? Seriously?

[Richard Hakluyt]

I was thinking to myself the other day, "why are people getting so cross about a continuity government?"; but then I reflected "that is precisely why they are so cross". I think we have a huge shakeup coming, I would like Labour to start that shakeup as the alternative is a shakeup starting in 2029 led by Farage (and I don't think he is up to the job).

Is there anyone who can implement a shakeup and get us out of this long, slow decline? Looking at the array of 3rd-raters I doubt it.

It would be helpful if they started thinking about the country more, and a bit less about their parties.

[Josquius]

Streeting a real monkey's paw Starmer replacement for sure.

Whatever happened to Burnham's move for the leadership?

Heard an interesting interview from Polanski the other day- he said the quiet bit out loud, of course he doesn't expect to be PM, but he hopes to scare Labour into moving left and actually doing something to benefit normal people.
I've been saying this for years. Labour trying to out-reform reform just isn't going to work. Losing voters to the left is a far bigger issue- not to mention that policies in this direction are actually the right thing that needs to be done.

[Sheilbh]

Streeting? Wes Streeting? Seriously?

This is possibly my most conspiracy theory view on al this, that a lot of the people around Starmer and in Number 10 are from the New Labour right of the party. Starmer fundamentally doesn't really have strong views which is the cause of a lot of problems, but I think he basically has them around because they've got an electoral (if not a political) strategy and he asks people like Tony Blair "who's good?" and appoints them.

The preferred candidate of the New Labour wing of the party is absolutely Wes Streeting. But it would always be difficult because the party isn't in that place as they were in the 90s. In part I think because the Tories collapsed more quickly than anticipated. I think (as in so many ways) their expectation was to run the late 90s playbook - but times have changed. So I think the plan was for Starmer to be the Kinnock. He'd be the candidate of the soft left who'd de-Corbynise and get close but never win an election, then with the members exhausted and desperate for power they'd turn to Streeting.

While I don't think they've deliberately fucked up Starmer's term in office or anything like that. I do think the way Number 10 have cleared out/attacked all other alternatives and a lot of the stuff they've done seem to me exactly what you'd be doing if you were actually prepping the ground for another leader more closer to your politics.

I was thinking to myself the other day, "why are people getting so cross about a continuity government?"; but then I reflected "that is precisely why they are so cross". I think we have a huge shakeup coming, I would like Labour to start that shakeup as the alternative is a shakeup starting in 2029 led by Farage (and I don't think he is up to the job).

Is there anyone who can implement a shakeup and get us out of this long, slow decline? Looking at the array of 3rd-raters I doubt it.

It would be helpful if they started thinking about the country more, and a bit less about their parties.

Yes. I also think there are structural and real problems in the system that makes it very, very difficult for anyone to get a grip. And I don't see much evidence that Farage is thinking about that yet (although him reading Mr Balfour's Poodle is maybe an interesting sign that he is thinking about it).

There are some very dark forces on the far-right at the minute. And I worry about what happens if the Tories can't get a grip, so the country votes Labour who also fail and then they turn to Reform - and what comes next if, as I suspect, they also can't get on top of things.

I'd add that the other risk for the government of constantly using the bond markets as a threat against any alternative candidates is that at some point the bond markets price it in. So I see that this morning there's record demand for gilts despite the possibility that Starmer might be forced out.

I did see Barry Gardiner being very critical on Newsnight and I feel like you've got into a lot of trouble when he is (1) right and (2) speaking for England

But I agree I think our politics also needs to start engaging with the country and not America basically. I think a lot of the problems for the left's analysis of where we are and what to do is a blief that we are as rich and as unequal as America - and we're neither (I think this also applies a bit to the right). Similarly that we've just had 15 years of radical right-wing Republican style government instead of the Tories. Their legacy wasn't deregulation and tax cuts for the rich, but the highest tax and spending levels in decades (with the top 10% being the biggest "losers" in terms of tax), record increases of pensions and minimum wages, significant increase in regulatory burdens (BOGOF, advertising, Online Safety, drink re-fills etc).

It's unpopular but we neeed to start from the point that we're a not particularly rich country (particularly per capita), not getting particularly richer. That we've salami sliced the state for the last 15 years - and even before that we loved outsourcing and public-private partnerships so everywhere we're paying more for less. We've got a lot of regulations but unevenly enforced - so the cost of trying to do things correctly is huge, while the penalty for breaking the rules is relatively low. And that we've massively narrowed our tax base. It's a different analysis.

Streeting a real monkey's paw Starmer replacement for sure.

I think, reluctantly, that he would be better.

I actually think the real monkey's paw is Ed Miliband because I think he'd be an absolute disaster on so many fronts...but the party members love him and would immediately elect him given the chance

Whatever happened to Burnham's move for the leadership?

He's not an MP and the Manchester MP with health issues who everyone expected to step down and make way for Burnham has decided not to (I'm sure there was no pressure whatsoever from the party leadership on that). That was and still is the biggest obstacle for Burnham.

But also Number 10 absolutely nuked him during conference. I think it was very ill-advised but you had loyalist MPs sharing memes of Burnham with Truss' hair and outfit etc, attacked him on the bond markets, attacked him over grooming gangs. I think the party would still quite like him (I actually think Burnham's a bit like Boris Johnson in that how he is perceived is very different from his actual politics in a useful way).

On Burnham I would just add that Lucy Powell, his ally who won the deputy leadership, has already come out against any tax rises that break their manifesto pledge (so no income tax, VAT or NI) which the government will break. Which is just an interesting piece of positioning.

[Tamas]

Not to be mean but could we please prevent ourselves, before it gets too late, to discuss any assumptions that Farage is thinking about anything else but Farage. He is Johnson pushed to the extremes of lazy grifterness. He is bound to be a disaster because governing is more complex than attention-biting snippets of bigotry, he will have no persistence to deal with complex policy and he is surrounded by far-right businessmen and bellends.