#it's fucking Brexit all over again

[thetardisisnotourdivision]

So hhow would you like us to perform Shakespeare, sir? Mouthing it? Sign language? Interpretive dance? Oh, you mean you're a pretentious gatekeeping snob who thinks Shakespeare was some aristocratic literary genius. The man was the son of a glove maker and the actors would have been working class, some of them will have been foreigners (I know, shocking, right?), and you're saying they wouldn't have had strong accents - because that's what you mean, isn't it? Give me a break. Go do your research, you idiot, and then you can write stupid articles about Shakespeare.

[starfleetwitch]

AM I HAVING A FUCKING STROKE?!

or did Rishi Sunak really basically just admit IN FRONT OF THE WORLD that taking the UK out of the EU was a terrible decision? Also what I heard: "This country we took but dont acknowledge until it benefits us is in the best position in the world in terms of access to the market"

[ofcowardiceandkings]

writes "get fucked" in reply to a survey question about small boats

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

please tell us more about your mad theory about the tories getting rid of Sunak?

So the Tories currently have two (2) major problems.

Problem the first: they are about to lose power as soon as the GE rolls around, which it must do by January 2025 at the absolute latest. And the country is baying for one sooner.

This is very much preoccupying their minds at the minute. The rich and powerful will never willingly let you vote away their wealth and power, and to put this into perspective, the Tory party has ruled this country either jointly or alone for over a decade at this point. One of David Cameron's strategies as leader was to focus on recruitment of young and exciting diverse Tories into the party, which is how we got such stellar entries as Liz Truss and Priti Patel and Suella Braverman. These are MPs, therefore, who have never known political life outside of being on the winning side. They are seeing the end of the gravy train in sight, and they are taking it as well as you'd expect.

This is why the infighting is so rife (partly; bear with). The main thing they care about right now is making the party electable again, and fast.

But...

Problem the second: like all good fascist dictators, when Boris Johnson came to power, he fired everyone who said anything bad about him for disloyalty, and promoted all his personal friends. This is how we got such stellar entries as Nadine Dorries and Jacob Rees Mogg and Michael Fabricant. But THAT'S an issue because saying bad things about BJ is basically what intelligent people did, because the man was a useless blundering oaf who killed horrifying numbers of his own electorate via the world's second worst mismanagement of a global pandemic. So removing anyone who criticised him meant, in very real terms, removing the only Tories with half a brain who were even a fraction capable of doing joined up thinking required to run a country. Like, fuck every Tory with a cactus, obviously, but they did at least used to have competent, high calibre politicians, however evil and grotesque they were. David Cameron should die in a cesspit, but he was capable of remembering to put the bins out (before wage cutting the refuse collectors).

And therein lies the real problem: okay, BJ is gone, the party is in ruin, they're staring down the barrel of the most humiliating election defeat in history. They need someone competent that they all like who can take the reins and make people like them again.

But who's left?

There's no one. There's no one left. Not just because the remaining Tories are too low calibre to lead; they're too low calibre to even be able to pick someone without shrieking like cliquey little harridans on the playground about how the wrong in-group got in. Half of them are still BJ loyalists who hate anyone who criticise The Great Brexit Leader. The other half hate BJ for managing to make everyone hate the Tories so much that they're in this mess. Both halves are willing to sabotage the chosen leader of the other, locked in a battle of mutually assured destruction.

So how does Sunak fit into this?

He's unpopular in the party to a truly staggering degree, and not much better in the eyes of the public. He's tried to take a centrist stance on BJ, but that's actually just pissed off both sides. He did manage to stabilise the economy somewhat after the appalling mess Liz Truss threw it into, but he hasn't actually fixed it - we're still mid-cost of living crisis, we're still inexplicably not rich after Brexit like Boris prommied, inflation is still at an all time high as public services crash. The public hates him.

And he hasn't made the public stop hating the Tories. That petition calling for a GE is great, because it won't happen - BUT, it does force the issue to be debated in Parliament with opposition parties getting to stick the boot in, which means the humiliation continues. The Tories are starting to get desperate again.

And because this lot of Tories are, as mentioned, utterly terrible low-calibre political idiots, their response to this pressure has for the last four years been to oust the leader and get another.

And the first letters of no confidence have been sent into the 1922 Committee already. The devil moves fast, but knuckle dragging Tories with a fifth of a braincell each move faster.

And thanks to the absolute fucking state of them all... I cannot believe I'm saying these words, but genuinely the best person they have left who could possibly do the job is, of all fucking people, Michael Fucking Gove, and it won't even be him because he was mean to Boris once.

So yeah. I reckon Sunak may be out in six months. Fuck knows who we get instead. Probably Penny Mordaunt.

[qqueenofhades]

i do genuinely hesitate to ask, as i am sure i will find out more than i meant to in time, but atm my various feeds and an uninformed google are not telling me what most recently exploded about the british government, so if you have the time and the inclination i'm agog for your summary/take

HOO BOY. It has been a Things Exploding In the British Government day to the extent that in the hour-odd between my previous post and this one, I had to go back and check if anything ELSE had exploded while I wasn't looking. Everything that they are currently denying will probably be confirmed within the next 12 hours or less, though, so nobody get too comfortable.

Anyway, we all remember how Liz Truss succeeded Boris Johnson as Prime Minister, met the Queen, the Queen immediately fucking croaked which honestly was the funniest time she could possibly have done it, the country ground to a total halt for ten days, and then when it got going again, Truss and her chancellor (aka finance minister, for those of you happily ignorant of British politics), Kwasi Kwarteng, proposed a Thatcherite wet-dream economic plan of unfunded massive tax cuts for rich people, because something something Stimulate Growth. We are also generally aware that this crashed the pound through the floor, blew up people's mortgages and other mildly important bills, and did nothing to deal with the actual energy bills/cost of living crisis currently engulfing the UK. Oops.

After absolutely everybody, including the commie socialists at the Bank of England, screamed OH MY GOD WHAT ARE YOU MORONS DOING???, and the day after Kwarteng insisted he would absolutely remain in post and he had 100% confidence in the Plan, he... got sacked for creating this, the Plan that Truss had asked him to deliver and which had won her the Tory party members' election. This made him officially the second-shortest serving chancellor in UK history aside from the guy who literally died in office. Womp womp. That will be a pub quiz answer for you. You're welcome.

Having spent all this time hiding from the press, then giving eight-minute press conferences during which you could literally track the pound crashing in real time, and performing more U-turns than a dancing dashboard hood ornament, Liz Truss took a break from her busy schedule of conducting the Economic Disaster Waltz in the key of B Fucked to appoint Jeremy Hunt as the new chancellor. Jeremy Hunt is mostly notable for being a Tory who can put his pants on without assistance and being a genteel failure at all the previous cabinet posts he's held, which is why he is now regarded as a "safe pair of hands" in a party that has dissolved into a lot of shit-flinging coked-up gibbons who can only scream BREXIT BREXIT BREXIT and IMMIGRATION IS BAD!!! (Side note: they recently had to cancel a festival designed to "celebrate the freedoms of Brexit" due to logistics issues associated with, you guessed it, Brexit. That is not directly relevant to the current clusterfuck, but it is too funny not to include.)

To nobody's surprise, Jeremy Hunt then ripped up the entire economic plan and offered a new one, which was not measurably better than the last one but at least reversed some of the most egregious cuts, and which made everyone ask if Liz Truss had been tied up and duct-taped in the boot of a Range Rover and/or if Hunt had secretly staged a coup with the help of Larry the Downing Street Cat and taken over the government. Probably nobody in the Tory party would mind very much if he had, because they were all busy either planning how to oust Truss or publicly denying that they were indeed planning to oust Truss. One of the popular names for her successor? Boris Johnson! No, I am not making this up. Maybe this has all been a horrible dream and we're going to wake up and find that BoZo is back in charge, after massive public scandal for being a serial liar, which he had been from Day 1, finally made him resign. I repeat, what even the hell is going on here. Nobody knows. Meanwhile, Hunt is warning about even more budget austerity and "eye-watering" cuts to public services that can least afford it, because the last decade didn't result in quite enough preventable deaths for the Tories' tastes, and because they have been forced into this by a car crash completely of their own making.

....anyway. This brings us, more or less, to today. Yesterday, Truss refused to commit to protecting something called the pensions triple lock, which guarantees that old-age pensions (the UK form of social security) will rise in line with inflation, costs, or earnings. A) Inflation in the UK is now at a whopping 10.1%, and B) given as old people are literally the only demographic still willing to vote for the Tories, this miiiiiight seem like an even more unnecessarily stupid and self-sabotaging idea. Sure enough, U-Turn Number Eight Million was duly performed this morning, and Truss insisted she had always intended for the triple lock to be protected. But would Universal Credit and other welfare/benefits programs also be adjusted upward for inflation? HELL NAH! THOSE ARE FOR POOR PEOPLE! GROSS!

This, however, was only the beginning of the unpeeling of the latest idiot banana. Keir Starmer, riding high on the back of recent polls that have given Labour a 36-point lead and predicted that the Tories could be left with as few as 22 seats in Parliament if a general election was called tomorrow (leaving the SNP as the official opposition), appeared at Prime Minister's Questions and got to shoot fish in a barrel. Truss did not dissolve into a pile of goo on the floor and/or have a bucket of water thrown on her and melt into Margaret Thatcher, so that was taken as a win. Well, at least for two hours or so. Then Suella Braverman, the ex-Attorney General who had briefly run for the leadership when BoZo resigned, and who exists along with Priti Patel in order to prove that in the modern Tory party, women of color can heroically be just as much as awful xenophobic monsters as crusty old white dudes, resigned as Home Secretary. Did you even know she was Home Secretary? Neither did she. She took over Patel's job in a bid to apparently make Patel look cute and cuddly by comparison, as she is even more determined to do horrible things to migrants as much as possible. The official reason given for her resignation was that she sent an official document from her personal email account, and this had something to do with immigration and/or the Office of Budget Responsibility forecast that the Tories have, in the valiant spirit of freedom, resisted actually publishing for any of their current economic plans. CONSERVATIVES ARE GOOD FOR THE ECONOMY!! yell people on both sides of the Atlantic. Oh-kay.

Anyway, Braverman used her resignation letter to blast Truss for pretending that everything was fine and dandy, which means the BUT HER EEEEEEMAILS was absolutely just an excuse and even she wanted off this sinking ship as fast as possible. Grant Shapps is now the Home Secretary. It's not important. The point is, if more ministers start resigning, the government will probably implode just as it did when they deserted BoZo en masse. What the hell happens then? Fuck if anyone knows. Since they will, as noted, get absolutely cosmically annihilated if they call a General Election, the Tories will resist doing that with all their might (the next one isn't due until 2024, which is about 1004329 years away at the current rate that time is passing here). Truss was already elected by a tiny minority of the country (about 160,000 Tory party members). STICK RISHI SUNAK IN THERE AND CHANGE THE RULES AGAIN?? HECK, SOUNDS LIKE A PLAN! KEEP THOSE MUSICAL CHAIRS COMING, CHAPS!

(Also: we will recall the Daily Star's Lettuce Cam, where a picture of Liz Truss has been placed next to a head of lettuce to see if she is kicked out of office before it rots away. It now has a special companion, Tofu. This is because Braverman, just yesterday, gave a speech attacking the latest round of climate protesters as being spurred on by Labour, the Lib Dems, and the "Guardian-reading, tofu-eating wokerati," which she doubtless thought was a very clever line at the time. Because British Twitter is British Twitter, the Tofu: 1, Braverman: 0 jokes have been rife.)

And since we are still not done: tonight, Labour forced a vote on a fracking ban which was being treated as a de facto confidence vote in the government. Aka if the Tories voted for it, they would be considered to be defying the government. Because Britain is a cartoon country run by clowns, the method of Parliamentary voting literally involves walking through Door A for Aye and Door B for Nay. The "whips," or the people whose job it is to assure that party members vote according to the government's position, have thus been known to physically stuff recalcitrant MPs through these doors, because Hail Britannia, or something. So we soon had reports that the anti-fracking vote was, dare I say it, a total clusterfrack, and the Tory whips were literally throwing crying Tory MPs through the Nay door so they would Vote To Support The Government. This sounds like a beginning to a Monty Python sketch, but it is just another ordinary evening in British politics in 2022! (Did Truss herself vote? Or BoZo, Patel, or any of the other Tory big beasts? Nope. Evidently she was "too distracted" with all the other crises going on, which probably means she just didn't want to show her face or she might get killed. Hard to blame her.)

So: the fracking ban was defeated, Labour MPs were like "oh my god the sheer clownery," even Tory MPs were spitting mad, we soon had more rumors that both the Tory chief whip and the deputy chief whip had resigned (currently in the Official Denial stage, so yeah, that will be confirmed before tomorrow morning), and I haven't even mentioned the part where one of Liz Truss's press aides admitted that they used to lie about various relatives of hers having just died so Truss didn't have to do interviews (actual quote: "just aunts and cousins, not any major relatives!"). We all wondered if that wasn't actually a lie but the minor members of the Truss family had voluntarily decided to die rather than have anyone know that they were related to her. Either that or she just sent MI6 after them. It's entirely possible.

[kinglivv]

One Bed

Kate Lethbridge-Stewart x Reader

Summary: Being Kate Stewart’s personal protection was a job full of challenges - aliens, monsters, the supernatural. But none as big as finding yourself in a hotel with her… and only one bed.

Warnings: Implied PTSD

A/N: Realised I’ve never done this trope so rectified that immediately! Also, first time writing for Kate - what do you think?

You couldn’t believe it.

It was classic. You couldn’t write it. One bed, one room, you and Katherine fucking Lethbridge-Stewart.

It was a work trip. Travelling out to Belarus to look at some potential satellite launch sites. UNIT was still regrouping after it’s recent Brexit dissolution, and your commander was desperate to begin scraping back that hard power. Seemingly pointless trips like these had become the norm in the absence of anything existential such as the Flux.

The trip had been last minute. You knew you were going to share a room with Kate - a product of budget cuts and a HQ concerned that as her protection detail in a hostile country, the room next door wasn’t close enough. The hotel however, had apparently royally screwed up by giving you a double instead of a twin.

“Right,” Kate said in a matter of fact tone. You both stand in the doorway, suitcases in hand, clutching yours like a rubber ring on a sinking ship. It feels like a dangerous threshold between sensibility - your job, your boss, your professional relationship - and something else unwritten.

“There’s obviously been a mix up,” she states.

“Yeah,” you clear your throat, “I’ll go down to reception, get it sorted?”

She looks at you. Her hand clasps and unclasps her suitcase handle.

“You could… But I mean, it’s fine. Right?” She says, “It’s the middle of the night, we’ve just been travelling 12 hours. If you’re not bothered, I’m not.”

You take a breath. She had a point. It wasn’t a big deal - two grown adults just sharing a bed on a business trip.

“Alright ma’am,” you agree, “it’s only one night either way.”

“Great,” she musters, and powers on into the room.

It is alright, you tell yourself. It was just Kate. Your boss. It wasn’t like you weren’t used to being glued to her side. That was what you were paid for - her personal protection. You were one of her “strays” as the office called it. One of her impulsive job offers. You’d been a mere police officer in the right place at the right time, when in the middle of an alien incursion, you’d knocked her out the way of a deadly bullet, almost getting hit in the process. She’d quickly made it her business to know everything of use about you; did you go to the gym a lot? How many languages did you speak? Were you satisfied with your job?

Upon finding you had the reflexes of a cat and couldn’t stand the police, you were hired.

You’d been by her side ever since. Everyday in the office, the occasional night shift, the odd weekend at her house in the country. It was fairly mundane work, lurking in the shadows and watching her every step, but you’d quickly learned that there wasn’t much downside to being paid to stare at Kate Stewart all day.

Back in the present, you find that co-existing with her in such close quarters is fairly uneventful. She takes a couple calls, does her emails. She showers and changes into checkered pyjamas. She asks after your dog and you ask after her kids. You go over the car’s planned route for tomorrow and at 11 o’clock it’s lights out. You curl up as close to the edge of the bed as you can get and try to ignore the smell of her fruity shampoo.

You wake to the sound of a muffled groan.

It’s pitch dark and hot. At first you jump, forgetting that you’re in a shared bed and you feel like duvet shift slightly. Then again - a groan. Followed by mumbles - scared mumbles.

You sit up to look at Kate. She’s a dark silhouette, but you can make out her tossing against the sheets. She’s having a nightmare, you realise.

Roll over, a part of you thinks. Spare her the embarrassment. But it’s difficult to listen to. Your heart twinges for her as her brow furrows in anxiety over imagined monsters.

You were her protection - it was your job to protect her.

“Commander,” you whisper gently, reaching out for her shoulder, and then more firmly, “Commander!”

Brown eyes snap open as she’s wrenched out of her nightmare and back into reality. She all but jumps away from you, narrowly avoiding falling out of the bed.

“You were having a nightmare,” you pull your hand away as she frantically wipes away tears and catches her breath.

“Sorry,” she mumbles.

“It’s okay,” you respond softly, “I get them too. More often than I’d like to admit.”

“I - um. Sorry,” she repeats, shifting to prop herself up against the pillows, and it’s only then that you realise how close you are and how wildly inappropriate this is, “I woke you didn’t I?”

“It’s alright,” you say firmly, “Can I… ask what it was? I don’t know - sometimes it helps me when I get them. To talk.”

“Oh,” she says dismissively, “just… you know. Sutekh stuff. The usual really.”

Your face falls. You felt a lot of guilt about that day. Seeing your death approaching and being able to do nothing about it. Watching her crumble to dust seconds before you did. You had failed her in that moment.

“Kate-“ you try to say but it chokes in your throat slightly. “I never apologised for that day.”

She frowns at you through the dark. “What do you mean?”

“I didn’t do my job properly that day,” you state, as if it’s obvious. “I should have been quicker. Done something. You died - as your assigned protection I literally can’t have cocked it up any moreso.”

“Cocked it up?” She repeats with a sort of sad myrth. “Darling, a god of death appeared in our office. The bloody Doctor couldn’t prevent it and you certainly couldn’t have done anything. You died seconds later, I seem to recall learning.”

You blink back tears and look away, picking the duvet pooled around your waist. She’d called you darling. You’d called her Kate. Uncharted territory.

“Have you been blaming yourself for my death all this time?” She asks quietly. Her hand reaches out, cups the side of your face, forcing you to make eye contact with her. Her touch is electric.

You nod silently against her palm.

“Darling,” she whispers again, and God you could die happy hearing her say that. “It’s not your fault,” she murmers. She’s closer now, leaning in, “it’s not your fault.” She whispers against your lips and then you’re kissing her.

It’s soft and cautious, and your mind goes black for a minute as you try to process the fact that all your fantasies are coming true at once. She breaks the kiss - perhaps to mentally list through all of the protocols and policies she’s currently breaking, perhaps just to catch her breath - and you stare at her dumbly, mouth open like a fish and tears drying quickly.

“Sorry,” she rambles hurriedly, “that was unprofessional. Was that alright? I can’t bear the thought of you carrying that guilt when -“

You lean in again and this time the desire hits you like a wave, taking everything within you to keep it at bay. There’s a sigh and her hand sneaks into your hair, the other fighting off the duvet tangled around her legs to get as close to you as possible. You slip a hand under the hem of her pyjama shirt to find hot, smooth skins and you moan into her mouth.

The noise seems to bring you back to yourself and the tension in the room snaps, reality flooding back in. The kiss breaks and she stares at you for a moment with a sort of wonder in her eyes.

“Wanted to do that for a while,” you confess before she can say anything.

“Me too,” is all she manages. She leans in again, but you muster every resolve within you and pull away after a few seconds. She pouts.

“You have to be up at 6am tomorrow,” you point out.

“I’ll sleep in the car,” she quips back.

“Someone has to drive that car,” you retort.

She laughs and it’s a nice sound, much better than her whines of fear as she shook in the grip of her nightmare, only minutes earlier.

“I never get to tell you how much I appreciate you,” she says, shifting to lie back down and pulling you down with her. Her golden hair splays around her head like a halo, and fingers thread through yours. “You make this job a damn lot easier for me, you know that? Not just the safety stuff, but just… you.”

You know what she means. You pull her into you and she sleeps sounder than she has in months.

[toaarcan]

Rishi Sunak and the D-Day Disaster

Babes wake up, Rishi Sunak did a fuckup again!

Hokay, so, at time of writing, yesterday was the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings during World War II. This is a big deal for a lot of reasons, D-Day is one of the most significant events in the largest and most destructive war humanity ever fought, and this is likely to be the last major anniversary that the surviving veterans will be alive and well enough to attend.

Political leaders from the world over made their way to the Normandy beaches for a commemoration. Biden, Trudeau, Macron, Scholz, and Zelenskyy were present. Keir Starmer was there, as were King Prince Charles and Prince William, but the UK government proper was represented by Rishi Sunak and David Hameron.

Until suddenly it wasn't!

Let's run down everything (that I'm aware of) that went wrong!

As part of the British event, army paratroopers landed on the beach... and then had to reconvene in a tent to get their credentials checked by the French authorities. Because Brexit happened and we don't have free movement any more! Pro-Brexit nimrods have, predictably, complained about getting exactly what they voted for.

Once each nation's part of the proceedings were done, they were to reconvene at Omaha Beach for an International commemoration. Speeches, medals being awarded, that sort of thing. Except... Rishi Sunak was not present.

No, see, Rishi "The Least Elected PM Ever" Sunak had stayed until the end of the British event and then promptly fucked off back to England, snubbing the leaders of America, France, Canada, Germany, and Ukraine and leaving everything in the hands of the Hameron, his also-unelected foreign secretary that last rubbed shoulders with any International politicians when he was fucking everything up in 2016. Also, in the hands of his main rival, Starmer (Okay calling Starmer and Sunak rivals is a bit unfair, it implies Sunak has a snowball's chance in hell, which he does not).

Naturally, people were pretty fuckin' steamed about this, and put Rishi on blast for showing enormous disrespect to... literally everyone involved. Especially since this is right on the heels of Sunak proposing that they bring back National Service to "fill young British people with loyalty and honour."

Don't worry it gets worse.

Naturally, there are a lot of journalists with cameras present, and this means that we get to see images like these:

Image Description: Left to right, David Cameron, Emmanuel Macron, Olaf Scholz, and Joe Biden, standing in front of a partially cloud blue sky. Macron, Scholz, and Biden are lit by the sun, while Cameron appears to be in the shade.

Image Description: Keir Starmer sits, centrally-framed, among D-Day veterans in ceremonial dress uniforms. To the right of the frame sits Emmanuel Macron.

Image Description: Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Keir Starmer talking, with a photojournalist in the background aiming his camera at them. Both are smiling.

Quote Pippa Crerar, writing for the Guardian (You may remember her from that time she blew the lid off of Partygate!), Starmer is "already looking like a Prime Minister."

So this is really, really bad for Rishi. Britain has been keen to support Ukraine lately, and we've actually shipped a supply of our Challenger 2 tanks over to them for their use. The impact from this hasn't been as massive as you'd hope, largely because the British military has been absolutely gutted under the Tories, for reasons that I'm sure had absolutely nothing to do with all the financial support David Cameron got from Russians, but Britain has been trying to help.

Boris Johnson in particular liked to really stress the Ukraine point whenever he was losing control of the narrative, essentially making Ukraine's plight and his support for them a shield from criticism. And now, here's the leader of the opposition being photographed in a positive light with Zelenskyy. The optics are incredibly bad for Rishi.

But surely, Rishi had a reason why he had to zip back to British soil post haste? Maybe an emergency that he had to resolve?

No, he needed to record an interview with ITV, for his election campaign. That was it.

Well, interviews in election cycles become outdated pretty quickly. Normally a few days is enough to render them outdated. It must've been pretty urgent.

No, the interview is scheduled for release in six days' time.

That's an eternity in election season. There's a high chance that more than half of its content will be void by the time it airs.

As a reminder, we are four weeks from the big day. In fact, yesterday was exactly four weeks before election night. Time is very short.

Well, maybe this was the only time they could fit him in?

Nope, Paul Brand of ITV has confirmed that this was the date and time Rishi wanted, and they could've moved it to prevent scheduling conflicts!

So, how did a fuckup on such a grand magnitude happen? How did Rishi manage to create a clash between the 80th anniversary commemoration of an event with a specific date (6th June, 1944 is not hard to remember, my guy!) and the election that he called? Well that's very simple! He didn't want to be there at all.

Yes, it seems that Rishi had already told the French government a week ago that he wouldn't be attending at all. Someone seems to have convinced him that skipping the event entirely was a bad idea, but not enough for him to actually commit to it.

Image Description: A block of text reading "The French government was told a week ago that Rishi Sunak would not attend the D-Day 80th commemoration, Tory sources have confirmed. The message to Paris from his team was that he would be too busy campaigning in the general election to make the trip. The decision was reversed, and a short visit was the compromise, but it is extraordinary that an attendance by a Conservative PM, or any PM, was ever in doubt."

Rishi has denied this, however, so the whether it's true or Sunak has elected to not lie for once, well, that remains to be seen.

Quote John Healey, Labour's defence spokesperson, “Given that the prime minister has been campaigning on the idea young people should complete a year’s national service, what does it say that he appears to have been unable to complete a single afternoon of it?”

Conservative commentator Tim Montgomery called it "political malpractice."

And so, after thumbing his nose at half the world in order to pursue an already-foundering election campaign, Rishi Sunak decided that he needed to apologise. Via tweet.

It's been a very bad day for Rishi Sunak.

[octuscle]

hey can your app help me?

Im in my third year of uni and i’m really not sure why I took this degree. I finish in a year and have no clue what i want to do with my life. I go to uni in a very chavy area and they all seem so chilled and laid back. it makes me very envious. I’ve always worked hard in school and at uni too and now I wish I could just relax and do fuck all like them. I’m swamped in deadlines and just need to get rid of all this stress. any solutions your app can offer?

Mate, I wouldn't just throw away all the hard work I've done over the last few years now. Ever thought about taking a vacation? Just switch off for a few days. Mallorca is supposed to be lovely this time of year. The air is pleasant, the sea is still warm…

Okay, the flight from Stansted to Palma was really exhausting. When you have the scallies as close to you as in the plane, they are not relaxed. Then they are loud. Then they are obtrusive. And then they have a dubious body hygiene. You just want to get out of the plane. In such a hurry that you take the wrong bag out of the hand luggage compartment. But you only realize this when you are sitting in the cab and want to tell the cab driver the address of your hotel. The only thing in the side pocket is a Thomas Cook voucher booklet. With vouchers for bus transportation. And for a two-star hotel in the third row in Magaluf. Damn, your wallet is gone, your documents, your money. How are you supposed to go on vacation for a week with 200 pounds in your pocket? Okay, according to the voucher even 10 days. But all inclusive. Fuck, make the best of it.

The cab driver throws you out of the cab. Obviously you have no money. The first bus to your hotel has left in the meantime. But the Thomas Cook representative shows you where the next one is waiting for you. In the bag was a pack of cigarettes. Actually, you don't smoke. But it's a vacation.

At the hotel, the lady at the front desk tells you that you have a voucher for half a double room. Your roommate is already upstairs. She can't give you a second key. If you want a single room, it costs 50 euros. Fuck again! Fucking Euros! You don't have any… You thought there was no euro since Brexit. Dude, get a grip… You can't get a clear thought together. Before you go to the room, you take a sip of the free sangria. Shit, that's sweet! A Guiness would be better now. One of the scallies from the plane bumps into you from behind. Your Sangria flows over your shirt and your pants. "Don't giv two shites, mate," says the chav. "but ya're wearin' way too much for a vacation in mallorca anyway." And laughs. It doesn't help, you have to go to your room and change. You knock on the door. Once more. Once more. One more time. "Hey, what the fuck, i'm fuckin' reel na," you hear from the room. "Mate, let me in, i dinnit hav a fuckin' key!" Did you really say that now. Your mate opens the door. Condom over rock hard boner. Makes high five, turns around and fucks the chick again.

You go into the bathroom with your bag. Fuck, your mate has already done a great job. You count at least five condoms. In the toilet, on the floor, in the sink. You take off your wet and sticky clothes and look what's in your bag. Five minutes later, you're standing in front of the mirror in surf shorts, wifebeaters, long white soccer socks and Adidas flip-flops. Now put on the fake gold chain. Hehehe, perfect for the pool party!

It is 02:00 o'clock, when you are drunk again at the room. From inside you hear your roommate snoring. You yell until angry shouts come from all the other rooms except yours. Hehehe, in the room next to you lives one of the horny guys from Liverpool, whom you have blown a while ago. He lets you into his room and you climb over the balcony into yours. Try it at least. You fall. Fortunately, you are on the first floor. Nevertheless, you have to puke from shock. And then you fall asleep in the flowerbeds.

After a week, you know which waiter you can bum cigarettes from. And which guest will give you ten euros for a blow job. Best vacation ever. Fuck yeah, your underpants are all either pissed or jizzed. You don't have a single clean t-shirt left, but on the beach you bought some fake soccer jerseys for a few euros. And the EA7 sports shorts look like real ones too. Hehehe, Liam lost his shirt in some chick's room again. And Darren is drunk again! Without you they wouldn't even find their hotel….

Tonight Germany plays against England. You want to go by bus to Palma. Watch the game. And no matter how it ends: Afterwards there will be a juicy brawl with a few German fans. As I said: Best vacation ever!

Fittin' pic found at @scallyplanet 

[your-queer-dad]

Tw for talk of suicide

Hay dad sorry if this ends up being kinda long but it's late and I can't sleep

I just feel like I'm never content for more than an hour or two anymore, unless I'm with friends but that doesn't happen as often as it used to, not because of drama or anything we just don't live close it's just over an hour for the bus

Nothing I like feels the same anymore though, like, I still enjoy it but it doesn't feel the same. I'm almost done with college for the summer and then I'll really have nothing to do

I feel like I've spent this whole year talking myself out of suicide every other fucking day, and with the UK elections next Thursday I've literally had to plan it so I'm with a friend all day so I don't hurt myself

I haven't been this freaked out for an election since like,, the beginning of brexit, and no outcome is a good one honestly

I don't know what to do anymore, I'm too scared to get any "profession" help due to previous bad experiences and don't like going to my friends all the time, they say don't mind it but I know how insufferable and clingy I get when upset. It's not fair on them if anything

Hey kiddo! I'm really proud of you for still being here. I know it's frightening right now- and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't frightened about the elections too. But, we have survived this before and we will survive this again. No outcome is good but there are some that are better than others. We're gonna be okay. I promise you. Everything's gonna be okay. I'm always here for you kiddo 🫂🫂

- dad x

[thepalmofyourfreezinghand]

You are one of a very few tumblr users that I follow with Taylor-related content, and I genuinely wonder with what you’ve been showing at the moment, where is your stand in the fandom? As an ex bipoc fan of Taylor who cannot listen to her songs anymore, I feel so confused with what you show with all the q&a and you still seem to support her music? I know you can do whatever you want as a fan and I don’t mean to sound like i’m attacking you. I just can’t understand how people preach on the way she goes against what she had showed in years and yet still stream the new songs like nothing happened, it’s quite confusing for me to see

Don’t worry, you’re not attacking me hahah. And I honestly feel quite confused myself most of the time.

For example, yesterday night I was about to go on another rant about Matty because I cannot stand people calling him “a leftist”. They were eating up his “advocacy” for Scottish independence which is honestly laughable because the Scottish self-determination movement is probably the most supported and less controversial one in the entire world, especially after Brexit. Like, call me up when he tells his government to get the fuck away from the Chagos Archipelago, for example. Preaching for Scottish independence is hardly leftist.

But then this morning I woke up and the first thing on my mind was going online and checking the surprise songs. And when I realized that she had sung False God (which is literally my third favorite song from her ever) I proceeded to watch like ten videos of the performance.

It’s difficult to get over her and get over what she means to me, because when I think about my highest and lowest points in my life in the last fourteen years, her music was always there.

And it’s not the first time I’ve felt seriously disappointed in her. A few months ago, when she encouraged people to get up and applaud for Nicki Minaj (a woman who’s doing exactly what Taylor is doing, only her partner is obviously much worse than Matty), I was so disgusted that I didn’t listen to her music for a few days. But I came back because it’s hard to get away from something that constitutes such a big part of my life.

I guess deep down I still hope that this is till a big “mistake” (I mean, it’s clearly worse than a simple mistake, but you get what I mean). I still hope that in a few days/weeks MH will be gone. I’d never look at her the same way ever again, but at least I’d feel less guilty about continuing to support her.

If she stays with him forever, though, I’d stop supporting her. It’s difficult to do that right now because it’s been less than a month since they started dating and I’ve been following her for like 160 times as long. She’s such a huge part of what I like and what I am.

For what it’s worth, I won’t be buying the Speak Now TV album. I don’t like buying albums anymore anyway, but I initially thought about buying this one because of how gorgeous the cover is, but I decided I won’t do that anymore. I also won’t stream any music she makes with MH. If I like it I’ll download it illegally and call it a day.

(And yeah, I don’t need anyone to come and tell me that the money she loses from me is nothing - I know that and that’s not why I’m planning on doing that).

(And I also recognize that the fact that I’m able to act so hypocritically comes from a place of privilege).

The only thing I’m 100% sure about is that if she stays with him in the long term, then I’ll stop supporting her and talking about her and liking her beyond her music.

In the short term, while I don’t justify what she’s doing (and I don’t get how some fans can say “she’s attention-starved, it makes sense that she’d go to MH”), it’s hard to leave it all behind because she’s such a huge part of my life.

Does that make sense?

[spiltcandycoatedpunkblood]

the home secretary out here claiming that leaving the Euro Court of Human Rights and having our own British treaty of rights would still involve free speech is making me lose my mind on every conceivable level like we've literally lost the right to protest and given more power to police who have disrupted a vigil, taken down environmental and anti monarchy protestors and stood back as the public beat the former. like that is not free speech. but the ones against ultra low emissions are fine with motorists acting super oppressed and anti lock down protestors, and Christmas parties at No 10 during lockdown were fine. and we haven't even left the fucking ECHR for that to happen. this is just like Brexit all over again. they wanted to leave the EU but still have the benefits and went nuts when leaving the EU meant not having those benefits. like what are they expecting. you convince millions of people it's a great idea to leave the ECHR because racism against migrants. this government is openly transphobic, racist, misogynistic, and homophobic.

it's become normal, mundane, a reality. I don't know how to show it on my face in my parents' house anymore because we're all sick of it after trying to help people understand, and we'd just be repeating ourselves. I'm too weighed down by everything now. There's too many problems because of this country, but I can't constantly keep saying that as a reason!! How do we turn back from all of this???

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

Be it body hair, women’s lack of pockets, or films that are too long – there’s no shortage of things to pick up and beat men over the head with.

Brexit, climate change, COVID 19 deaths, the financial crisis, racism, homophobia, or even ‘the weaponisation of women’s hair’; the patriarchy and its little brother, ‘toxic masculinity’ are up to no good, yet again.

And it’s everywhere.

It’s in the cities. It’s in the streets. It’s in oceans, down the valleys and in trees above.

It’s in your breakfast cereal. It’s hiding under your bed. It’s making you late for work and leaving the milk out.

God damn patriarchy.

It’s fucking things up, for everyone, everywhere and quite literally, for all of time.

But whilst angry social justice warriors shake their fists at the sky and shout at clouds, the rest of us look puzzled as to what the hell they’re all yelling about.

Beards? Patriarchy. Bacon sandwiches? Patriarchy. Not recycling your plastic bottle? Patriarchy. The absurdity and fragility knows no bounds.

Luckily, some things are just too stupid to be offensive, and thankfully many of these things are exactly that.

And whilst I take no offence from the silliness of these articles, I must admit I may have lost braincells reading them, whilst the full body cringe has left me pretzel like and exhausted.

So, tell me, what has the patriarchy done to you?

==

Don't forget skyscrapers.

When you've run out of real things to complain about.

[bondsmagii]

Does ireland have a more plausible path to reunification now that football fingers is in charge?

literally being 100% serious here but Ireland is going to reunify sometime over the next decade or so. here's how I think it's gonna happen.

Brexit has fucked over Northern Ireland exponentially. there's a border in the Irish Sea, effectively cutting off the whole island anyway, and any hard border on the land itself is going to be impossible. it's just not practical, because when Ireland was partitioned they did such a stupid job of it. I mean, the border runs through towns, farmland, and even people's houses. a hard border (with customs and immigration control and all the expected shit) would just not be feasable. what are you gonna do? stop people bringing their sheep from field to barn because one's in the EU and the other isn't? stop people from bringing their grocery shopping from the front door to the kitchen because the kitchen is the EU and the meat is from outside the EU? come on.

so Northern Ireland has become a pain in Britain's arse again, and this time they can't shoot at the problem or unlawfully detain and torture it, so they're going to go for the other tried and tested British reaction to a problem: they're going to listen closely and think practically. ha! no. they're going to ignore it. so Northern Ireland is going to continue to get fucked over, with more issues with operating businesses, supply chains to supermarkets and the NHS, uncertainty, general inconvenience, etc. alongside this is the growing cost of living crisis in the rest of the UK, which is felt all the more in Northern Ireland because it's always been Britain's lowest priority, so there is no longer any convenience or security in remaining part of the union. this is going to piss off moderate unionists, and it's going to really piss off all the Protestants who used to not give a shit at all. only the hardliners are going to remain loyal to a union who doesn't give a shit about them, and those guys are sticks in the mud. you're never going to persuade them to use their noggins, and they're such a minority at this point that they're not worth listening to. gradually, this dissatisfaction and annoyance is going to turn to anger and disgust, and the majority required for reunification is going to appear.

I have seen this start to happen already. I cannot tell you the amount of ex-unionists I've seen who have changed their tune completely, realising as they have that Britain has never cared about them. I have seen regular non-political Protestants getting so pissed off about this that they've gone full pro-unification. I've seen Protestants, who formerly exclusively described themselves as British, claiming their right to an Irish passport and beginning to describe themselves as Irish Protestant. this is unprecedented. and I have seen it happening a lot. if the Republic is down for it, and the people vote it, and Britain keeps its promise, this is very plausible. the only thing I would be :/ about is the Britain keeping its promise part, but Northern Ireland is now such an inconvenience for it re: Brexit meaning Brexit (🙄) that I think they'd be happy to let us go lmao.

(yes, this will cause trouble with some of the hardline loyalists. I imagine there will be some civil unrest and a few shootings. but the loyalist paramilitaries were always backed up by the British military, and without them they're pure shite. couldn't hit a barn door with a bazooka, as my old man used to say.)

anyway tiocfaidh ár lá, probably in 2024.

[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

Is there any chance we could have a round up of the Circus? I am so lost on how the dominoes fell over the last 40 days

Okay this is not comprehensive, because (a) my husband the politics nerd is currently on his way to a gig in west Wales somewhere and so cannot chime in and also (b) all our political journalist friends are understandably quite busy right now doing political journaling, but I seem to have an influx of new followers who are also very confused and don't understand what's going on, so I shall try.

Alright so what we're seeing here is the Second Clownfall of 2022, the hotly anticipated sequel to the Adventures of Big Dog the Clown. However it revolves around the character of Liz Truss, and will use some terminology, so

Previous Reading

Important Terminology - Required Reading

What is a Whip?

How do Whips work?

Shadow Cabinet

Front Benchers, Back Benchers and the Cabinet

What do we need to call an early General Election?

The Adventures of Big Dog the Clown - Suggested Reading

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Elanor's Guide to Liz Truss - Suggested Reading

Character-based prequel

...okay I think that's everything. On with the show!

The Premiership of Liz Truss (2022-2022)

Week One

We begin our tale on September 5th, 2022. Coincidentally, that was also the date that I personally started my new job. Let's see which of us does better!

The Daily Mail is delighted, and runs a headline proclaiming "Cometh the hour, cometh the woman". Tory rag in a frock coat the Financial Times runs an op-ed:

So the results ARE IN! She will definitely fuck us up! But that's a good thing for vague reasons! Blitz spirit everyone. Tally ho, pip pip, shoot a servant and have sex with a wall, hey what. Good old Blighty.

(That's my best impression of Tories I'm good at their accents I hope you like it)

Truss does an interview with Laura Kuenssberg, and fellow guest and comedian Joe Lycett wildly and effusively applauds her every word. Even Liz realises no one would sincerely applaud her. Bafflingly, the entire right wing press and every member of the Tory party freak out about this, because they don't understand the function of a satirist and don't know how to defend against it. It is extremely funny. Joe Lycett announces he's a right-wing comedian now, and begins a new extended career bit effusively and sarcastically praising right wing politicians. They all cry extensively and call him mean.

SO, it's been a long hard leadership campaign! But she made it. For years, Tories have been blighted by the curse of the PM/Chancellor relationship, backstabbing and cheating and lying about each other to try and get power. But not our Liz, oh no; her Chancellor is Maths Mate and BFF Kwasi Kwarteng, an insipid and poisonous gnome known for three (3) things:

He once wrote a stupid book with Liz Truss about his stupid opinions on how he thinks economics work and everyone laughed at him and stuffed him in a locker

On the night of the Brexit vote he was overheard by a journalist gleefully saying “Who cares if sterling crashes? It will come back up again“ which are of course the words of a man who knows all about economics and how they work

This fucking bullshit back in July:

But hey IT'S OKAY! Everything is fine! Because Liz and Kwasi are BFFs who certainly never had an affair and are marching in lockstep and have each other's backs and both love maths more than their own children if they had any! Maths Friends!

Multiple resignations immediately follow.

Among them is Ben Elliot, the Tory Party chair, which is a pretty big deal from a man who just lived through the Johnson years; also, shockingly, Priti Patel, the deportation-happy Home Secretary, decides that even as an animatronic goblin she cannot support this nonsense.

It's not a resignation per se, but at ten to seven in the evening it's announced that Andrew Bridgen, the Troy MP for Leicestershire North West, has been evicted from his home and ordered to pay £800,000 in legal costs, and a possible £244,000 in rent arrears. Also described as "dishonest" by a judge.

This is not directly relevant to Liz Truss but look, it was a staggeringly weird day and this was basically the topper.

Anyway.

Liz goes to the Palace and is duly sworn in by the Queen, who promptly keels over and dies the very next day. Parliament is instantly shut down for mandatory mourning. As omens go, this one was not subtle.

This triggers the circulation of some very awkward footage of Young Truss talking about how she thinks the Monarchy should be abolished for being a gross relic of horrifying social stratification. However you must understand that it's not awkward because anyone thinks she murdered the Queen. It's because Liz Truss's attempts at public speaking are like sitting through a children's Christmas play when you're the only person in the audience and they can all see your face so you have to look encouraging for four hours when inside you are shrivelling into something approximating an apricot pit travelling to the core of Jupiter.

Take a look at her acceptance speech and wither.

Anyway we're now several MPs and a queen down so she's got to get on replacing those so she can focus on her real love: the much-anticipated mini-budget that she is preparing with Kwasi to save the UK from the harrowing quagmire of crippling poverty that Big Dog managed to drive us into (all while pretending it wasn't Big Dog who did it.)

Fortunately, she does not need to replace the queen! Monarchies take care of themselves, which many people would argue is very much the problem, of course. They had a proper reunion with Meghan From Suits and Meghan From Suits' husband, both of whom were banned from visiting Balmoral, and also the Nonce flew in, who was allowed to visit Balmoral. Such heartwarming scenes.

But the Cabinet, that's another matter. That's something Liz DOES have to do, and it's important she gets it right, Tumblrs, because you see, every time a Cabinet minister is replaced it's expensive and a hassle and it weakens a government by making them look all crumbly, like a packet of biscuits that's been rammed against a wall and now someone is opening it and everyone is bracing for Crumbs.

So, step forward to the Cabinet soulless ghoul Suella Braverman, the new Home Secretary. She immediately distinguishes herself by trying to legalise torture.

And then, naturally,

YEAH THAT'S RIGHT IT'S TICK TOCK TERF O'CLOCK also FUCK the sovereignty of the Scottish Parliament amirite ladies lol Girl Power uwu

Not that she can actually do anything at this point, of course. As I say: Enforced Mourning is in process, which means Parliament is shut down for ten days. No work, no speeches, no appearances, no announcements, just taxpayer's money going on legal fees to see if she can interfere with another nation's elected government in order to strip away the human rights of queer people.

However, while we all weep over the corpse of Queen Lizzie Two and beat our breasts in grief, the already-beleaguered pound is slowly bleeding out through this inaction. And this, to the Maths Mates, is unacceptable.

Two things get quietly slid into the news cycle.

Thing the First:

BIG YIKES LADS

Thing the Second:

Fracking ban in England lifted in bid to boost UK gas supply - BBC News

For those who don't know, fracking is an energy extraction process. Water, gas and dust are pumped at high pressure into shale bedrock to crack it open, releasing pockets of natural gas that can then be harvested for fuel. It's environmentally disastrous for multiple reasons, both direct (earthquakes, groundwater pollution, social impacts) and indirect (IT'S STILL A FOSSIL FUEL YOU STUPID CUNTS ARE YOUR SKULLS FUCKING EMPTY). The Welsh and Scottish governments have both banned it outright, a straight-up "Foot down no, petal". England, though, is the Tory paradise, so the ban was less complete.

However, this is still a Huge Deal - the 2019 Tory manifesto was very clear that fracking would only be unbanned IF "the science shows categorically that it can be done safely". In fact, most Tories don't like it either. Their constituents REALLY don't. Also in March Kwasi Kwarteng literally went on record and said it wouldn't lower European gas prices anyway; but not anymore! Now he thinks it's a zippy idea. Just spiffing. Top hole, pip pip (I'm so good at their accents :))

Scientists who have been studying the environmental impacts of fracking produce their report -

And it is quietly buried, so as not to offend the corpse of Lizzie Two.

Here ends the first four days of the Reign of Liz Truss.

Second Week

Anyway, royalists have gone insane and started a REALLY BIG queue to see a box that supposedly contains the rotting cadaver of the old queen. Multiple people have to be hospitalised because they join the Queue and don't take food, water, warm clothes, or essential daily medications with them, even though the Queue is literally days long. Some die. Many take the ashes of their own loved ones so they can wave them at the box for the thirty seconds they get to be in front of it, like a sort of play date for ashes.

Prince Charles, now King Prince Charles, starts swanning about as King, demanding everyone be sad for him and clap him to cheer him up. Someone holds up a sign saying 'Not my King' and gets arrested. This triggers a whole wave of protests and arrests as free speech slides out the window, until the Met Police chief has to step in and explain to the police like they're five-year-olds that they can't do that, actually, and need to cut that shit out.

But we can't wholly blame the police, because the main pressure to clamp down on protestors actually came from...

The government.

Meanwhile the country goes bat shit fucking insane. In order not to offend the fragile sensibilities of royalists, now so brittle they need to be treated with the same delicate touch normally reserved for unstable nitroglycerin, the UK sees supermarkets lowering the volume of self-serve checkout desks, people's funerals cancelled, vital operations and other medical interventions postponed, Centre Parcs cancelling holidays, FOOD BANKS CLOSING, Nintendo Direct cancelling its live stream in Britain (but not cancelling the release of the recording onto You Tube an hour later because as we all know Queen Elizabeth II was a MASSIVE livestream fan and would have been DEVASTATED to miss it but she was very 'meh' about YouTube), cycle racks being closed, and this unhinged shrieking harridan:

Very normal, lads. Very normal.

Oh and also they cancelled Owain Glyndwr Day so as a Welsh person I am now legally allowed to forcibly ram a daffodil into the urethras of the landed English gentry.

However, the protests grow as the suppression wanes. By the time King Prince Charles comes to Wales, he is met with silent protests, this guy who learned a sentence in Welsh specially for the occasion, and a petition to abolish the Prince of Wales title.

Except government is still shut down, so the petitions are all suspended.

But not to worry! That gives the Maths Mates more time to work on their special mini-budget.

Week Three

More of the same at first, really, but she finally addresses the nation to announce that the Queen was the "rock" on which "modern Britain was built".

Also someone finally spots that the necklace she always wears is a day collar, so that was fun.

BUT THEN

The moment we have all been waiting for, with baited breath.

On the 23rd September, 2022, the mini-budget finally arrives. The golden egg of Kwasi and Liz, their beloved, beautiful child, the crowning glory, the culmination of their economic beliefs and values. They are so proud of it, so sure of it, that they do not even submit it for the approval of the Office for Budget Responsibility. Why should they? This is the moment Kwarteng can finally show the world that he was right; that this is the way to do economics after all; that he alone in his brilliance and genius has reinvented the field and will lead the country to a new era of riches and prosperity.

And the pound does this:

Yikes.

Truss goes into hiding for a day and a half, during which time her aids claim all her relatives have died so she won't have to speak to the press, which is obviously a simply fantastic quality in a Prime Minister. Finally, she resurfaces by doing a series of radio interviews for regional stations around the UK, hoping they'll be easier on her, starting with Radio Leeds. The good journalists of Yorkshire eviscerate her and strew her corpse through Adel Woods. It's downhill from there.

Week Four

One poll puts Labour 33 points ahead of the Tories.

It can be a little difficult to translate polls, because the electoral system is complex, so I asked my journalist friends. They cheerfully informed me that, if translated into a General Election, the Tories would have just 3 seats left.

Except! Of course, naturally, that is me reporting naught but the most extreme result, Tumblrs, dancing upon the bones of my enemies as I chant the rites to make the Tory party die faster. If I were to be fair about this - and I am, of course, a journalist of Integrity and Morals - I would actually give the average poll result. And I am wise and fair to all, ancient rites aside, so I shall.

The average poll result is still 19 points ahead.

Tony Blair's landslide Labour victory in 1999 was 12 points.

Rounding off the day, Labour declare that they are backing a change to a proportional representation voting system in place of the UK’s archaic first past the post system. Funny that.

Anyway, that mini-budget is going poorly. Realising unlimited borrowing rather than tax cuts for the rich is maybe Bad Actually, the Maths Mates decide to get the money for their bail-outs some other way. Can you guess, Tumblrs? Can you guess where they decide to get the money from?

Naturally.

Week Five

In a fascinating little twist, the papers claim Liz banned King Prince Charles from going to the Climate Summit in Egypt. This is interesting for about a billion reasons, not least of which is that the papers seem very angry about this and yet also that it's an unsubstantiated rumour - the phrase "it's understood that _" gets a hell of a workout.

She then does not go herself. Makes sense. They'll probably be mean to her about the fracking.

She then loses the support of the Daily Mail, a paper that five weeks before were ecstatic about her rise to power :( so sad. But why? What made them change their minds?

Well. What else from Truss, but a massive and catastrophic u-turn on the economy?

And she does! The absolute nutter!

Plans to cut the 45p tax rate for those earning upwards of £150,000 were abandoned, as were:

abolishing the planned rise in corporation tax

cutting the basic rate of income tax

the two-year energy bill support plan

scrapping the planned dividend tax hike

VAT-free shopping for international tourists

freezing alcohol duty

easing of IR25 rules for the self-employed

ALL GONE! All gone. The mini-budget is not working so lol jk we'll think of something else, that's how government works, right? The pound promptly implodes further. Of all people, Nadine Dorries is the one to criticise

WE ARE IN A TOPSY TURVEY UPSIDE DOWN WORLD

The Daily Mail still finds a way to say it's all Michael Gove's fault, though.

Anyway, the 5th October dawns bright and beautiful and YouGov polls rural voters:

THIS IS HUUUUUUUUUGE, because farmers just will not fucking stop voting Tory, AND YET. Wowsers. Not just popularity. Voting intention. She might as well have personally infected every farm in the South Downs with foot and mouth disease.

Truss realises her popularity is plummeting and she needs a new audience. She tries to appear down with the kids and declares that she's the only PM to have gone to a comprehensive school.

This is not true. Gordon Brown and Theresa May both did. However, it's certainly true that all three of them became PM by ousting a sitting PM, so there's that I guess.

Week Six

At this point I can start putting in PRECISE DATEs just call ME Robert Peston.

13th October

News reporters start speculating that she'll be done by the end of the month as the first rumoured letter of no confidence reaches us. People realise that her competition for shortest serving PM was a guy who died in office of TB at about the four month mark RIP king sorry about your lungs.

(A reminder - normally, if MPs want to oust a party leader, they must send in 54 letters of no confidence. This makes the 1922 Committee - a bunch of back benchers who preside over this shit - hold a vote of no confidence. A leader who loses gives way - this is very rare. A leader who wins is then immune to another such vote for 12 months, but they almost always crumble within a month or two anyway - this is much more common.)

This is extremely funny, because a newly-elected leader of the party has a 12 month immunity to votes of no confidence, same as people who've won such a vote. Likes charge reblogs cast apparently. MPs are getting desperate.

Pressure mounts. Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng announces that he is "Not going anywhere."

14th October

Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng is sacked and blamed for the entire economic mess.

Incredibly, Liz does this without first planning a replacement, so it's several hours before Jeremy Cunt suddenly reappears like the spectre at the fucking feast.

Meanwhile here's Ed Milliband on Twitter

Seven and a half years he waited to retweet that. Seven and a half long years, look, to have the last laugh.

In the end, he still went too soon.

15th October

Deputy PM and also Health Minister Therese Coffey (side note - have they always doubled up in roles like that? Or are there just not enough of them anymore?) announces that she loves antibiotic resistance and dead kids and also breaking laws:

16th October

The Sunday Times calls for Extremely Corrupt Former Grand Vizier Rishi Sunak to take over, and then a General Election so that Labour can take the reins.

The SUNDAY TIMES

Calling for LABOUR

The Sunday Mail tries to stir up support for Ben Wallace taking over, because no one has heard of Ben Wallace so he needs the boost, but then accidentally publish their front page with a different man

In another YouGov poll for the Times, not a single political group, age group, area of the country, gender, or other demographic said that Liz Truss was the right choice for PM

This is the new predicted election graph:

Yikes

17th October

The projected election results are a Labour victory so complete the opposition would be the SNP. Legend suggests Nicola Sturgeon's cackle on finding out was so powerful she accidentally resurrected a witchfinder.

18th October

Meanwhile in the Senedd, Welsh Tory leader Andrew RT Davies, a sort of humanoid boil dressed in ham, tries to accuse placid and gentle First Minister for Wales Mark Drakeford's Labour of being responsible for long ambulance waiting times.

T'was a mistake.

19th October

Oh boy.

Well, first of all, Suella Braverman sends an official email from her private email address, and then promptly leaves the Cabinet at cannonball speeds as though she's seen a brown child about to be given citizenship. Was she quietly fired by Jeremy Cunt? Did she do it deliberately to resign? On her way out, she blames the true source of our problems - the Guardian-reading, tofu-eating Wokerati.

Nigella Lawson spends the day tweeting tofu recipes.

Meanwhile, Graham Brady, the Chair of the 1922 Committee, comes to Liz Truss to inform her that he has in fact now received 54 letters of no confidence. Normally, of course, that would be considered enough to trigger a vote in her leadership; but not now.

However, these are unprecedented times. So he changes the threshold - if half of the Tories send him letters, her immunity will be revoked.

But the thing is, Tumblrs, the thing is...

It is all about to kick off in the most spectacular and catastrophic fireworks since Guy Fawkes had a dream.

Because Ed Milliband, once accused of leading the country to chaos and now riding high on the joy of his well-timed Twitter jab of Some Days Ago, wakes this morning and chooses violence.

He has spotted, of course, that no one likes fracking; even the Tories are against it.

He has also spotted that Liz Truss is very stupid.

So he goes into the House of Commons, and he digs a big pit and covers it over with twigs and leaves so it can't be seen, and he bakes a big cake and he places it in the middle of the twigs, and he sets up a net to fall as well and a big stick of ACME dynamite, and he hammers in little signs everywhere saying CAUTION - TRAP, by which I am of course being metaphorical because what he actually does is table a motion to extend the moratorium on fracking. The signs aren't necessary, really. This trap is easy to avoid.

All Liz Truss has to do, you see, is not use a three-line whip on this vote.

The three-line whip, as you'll all recall, is the highest level of coercion. MPs cannot defy a three-line whip. MPs cannot even abstain on a three-line whip. MPs have two choices on a three-line whip: to vote as they're told, or to be removed from the party. You obey or resign. That's all.

For this reason, it's sometimes called a 'confidence vote', as it is effectively a stand-in for one. The vote is not about the issue at hand - this is now a vote of confidence in your leader.

(He's also laid lesser traps. Years back when fracking was first being heavily discussed, Ed was Labour leader and one of the main figures in those discussions. During today, before it all Kicks The Fuck Off, a Tory stands and challenges him on previous statements about fracking, trying to accuse him of hypocrisy.

He was fucking ready for it.)

Graham Brady pops his head back around the door. He's changed his mind - a third of the party is all that's needed now to trigger a vote of no confidence in Liz Truss. And legend says he's only 17 off.

This is presumably the reason for what comes next.

Liz panics. Liz sees she's desperately unpopular. Liz sees that she has to do something to shore up support; and she sees that her important fracking rule, which her party hates her for, is now being challenged by a former Labour leader, and if he wins (which he will) she'll lose all credibility and maybe they'll take her nice office away and tell her she was a Bad Girl.

And so, with the inevitability of gravity on the now-leaden pound sterling, she makes it a three-line whip, and a confidence vote in her government.

INSTANT CHAOS.

There is uproar! There is rage! There is blinding fury! Tory MPs are standing up in the Commons and snarling and pissing and moaning! No one likes fracking except Jacob Rees Mogg! For TWO HOURS they shriek and scream and gnash their teeth, yelling at Liz Truss, demanding to know why this is happening.

(Legend has it chaos-deity Ed Milliband simply leaned back, put his feet up on the chair in front, and made Christian Wakeford hand-feed him grapes and fan him with a palm leaf, but this is unsubstantiated.)

And then, at 6.55, FIVE MINUTES before voting is ready to begin, the Tory Minister for Climate Graham Stewart stands up and declares that everyone should vote how they want because it's not a confidence vote.

Did I say there was chaos before?

Lol. Lmao, even. Rofl, in fact.

Now Tories leap to their feet and basically all scream one long, unending breath of WHAT-DO-YOU-MEAN-IT'S-NOT-A-CONFIDENCE-VOTE-WHAT-THE-FUCK-IS-HAPPENING-IS-IT-OR-IS-IT-NOT-A-CONFIDENCE-VOTE and so Stewart gets up again and says, right to everyone's faces, "It's not for me to say whether it's a confidence vote or not," which is an even faster and more spectacular u-turn than Truss herself could pull off given that he literally just said it wasn't and did so while being a minister.

And then the voting starts. MPs are now milling about like chickens who've sighted the hawk, clamouring to know if they're going to lose their jobs unless they vote for Satan. The Whips - specifically Chief Whip Wendy Morton and Deputy Chief Whip Craig Whittaker - descend upon them like fucking wargs on the hunt. They don't just spit vitriol and blackmail into MPs ears. They fucking bodily drag people into the right voting lobby. MPs are legitimately screaming. Grown men are crying literal tears. Labour's Chris Bryant reports holding multiple Tory MPs as they sob into his shoulder. Multiple MPs report similar scenes.

And Tories still don't know if this is even a damn confidence vote, or if they should just knock the Chief Whip's teeth out.

And then the Whips, filled with bloodlust and frenzy, suddenly realise that NO ONE IS LISTENING TO US, YOU'RE ALL SUPPOSED TO LISTEN TO US SO WE FEEL POWERFUL -

Cue sudden meeting in a locked room with Liz Truss. For over HALF AN HOUR.

So is it a confidence vote? No one is sure. Deputy PM Therese Coffey thinks so, so in the absence of the Whips she decides physical assault is her job now and is seen by David Linden MP (SNP) physically carrying someone into the voting lobby. Jacob Rees Mogg thinks not and starts yelling "It's not a confidence vote!", to which his colleagues reply, "Fuck off." Meanwhile the Whips have possibly resigned, no one is sure. It is still uncertain if this was a confidence vote.

And Ed Milliband basks in the chaos, playing the fiddle while it all burns around him.

Finally, voting concludes. The Whips reappear to lurk.

The votes are in - the government wins, and fracking will go ahead. But.

32 MPs abstained.

And one of those is Liz Truss.

Which is WILD??!? What possible benefit could she get from that??? No one knows. Everything is uproar again. Guess who else abstained? Well, riveted reader, here's a list with important names highlighted:

Nigel Adams, Gareth Bacon, Siobhan Baillie, Greg Clark, Sir Geoffrey Cox, Tracey Crouch, David Davis, Dame Caroline Dinenage, Nadine Dorries, Philip Dunne, Mark Fletcher, Vicky Ford, Paul Holmes, Alister Jack, Boris Johnson, Gillian Keegan, Kwasi Kwarteng, Robert Largan, Pauline Latham, Mark Logan, Theresa May, Priti Patel, Mark Pawsey, Angela Richardson, Andrew Rosindell, Bob Seely, Alok Sharma, Chris Skidmore, Henry Smith, Ben Wallace, Sir John Whittingdale, and William Wragg.

Kwasi still smarting about that p45, I see.

In any case it then turns out that Liz DID vote, but incompetently, because her voting card didn't read properly, which is actually fair given that she was being screamed at by angry Whips waving Graham Stewart's severed dick and balls around while they demanded power and authority. While she's clearing that up, the press are understandably waiting open-mouthed for comment, but don't worry Liz! Your old pal Jacob Rees Mogg is here to fill in for you!

And thus it is that JRM willingly chooses to go on the live news and calmly confirm to the nation that no one knows if it was a confidence vote or not.

Chaos. Chaos again. Unbridled chaos. The Whips are furious. Everyone is furious. The rebels are now in limbo, unsure if they're now out of a job. Tories are weeping, trying to work out if Rees Mogg WANTS to sink the party. Back bencher Charles Walker MP delivers a frank interview to the press absolutely SHIVERING with rage, like the drummer in a Fleetwood Mac concert. Ex-Lib Dem leader Tim Farron, a bland man known only for the time he himself willingly chose to go on the news and calmly explain that he's a homophobe without provocation, tweets that Liz Truss is a Lib Dem sleeper agent they sent in to destroy the Tories, sparking what is likely to be a whole slew of conspiracy theories by next week. No one knows what is going on. They all decide to sleep on it.

The good folks at Wikipedia ultimately decide to make three separate pages for the UK 2022 government crisis, and to label them with the month "to leave room for another by the end of the year."

Ed Milliband skips all the way home, and treats himself to a bacon sandwich.

20th October

Okay, Liz thinks, the morning after. Okay. Last night was bad. But today will be better.

So first... the vote.

Because there's bad news for Tories who like money and good news for people who like liveable planets - there are problems with the vote. For one, the vote counts are being called into question. Are the results reliable?

For another, the Speaker of the House of Commons calls for an investigation into the reports of, um, assault. So will the result stand?

It's so unclear! And so is that ongoing issue of whether or not the damn thing was a confidence vote. Angry whips say YES, JRM says NO, Downing Street refuses to pick up the phone to the BBC, but does send ITV's Robert Peston a text at 1am to say it was definitely a confidence vote and, unrelatedly, the Whips aren't resigning :)

I think we have found the price paid to keep the Whips.

Meanwhile. Let's see what this has done for Liz's leadership stability!

13 letters of no confidence are confirmed submitted by Sky, 5 of which came in overnight. The 1922 Committee reconvenes the coven to discuss matters. Simultaneously, the One Nation Conservatives reconvene their coven to discuss the same. Presumably there is much "Girl what are YOU doing at the Devil's Sacrament?"-ing and "Same cloak, how embarrassing"-ing. MPs are CLAMOURING for her head. It is VICIOUS. It's like cartoon piranhas in a supervillain's lair; which is highly appropriate, because that's exactly what Tory MPs are.

Graham Brady, head jester of the 1922 Committee, demands to see Liz Truss.

He walks into a room with her, and the doors are closed. Half an hour later, he walks back out of the room.

Ten minutes later, she calls a press conference.

45 days after being appointed, Liz Truss breaks the record, and becomes the shortest-serving British Prime Minister.

[qqueenofhades]

Not British so I apologize for my ignorance, but how is Boris Johnson again a potential pm? He just left?! How is there not a list of non disgraced candidates that should easily keep him from the job again? Can the other parties force a vote? I feel so bad for future students who are going to be tested over these last few years, just so much has happened it’s mind boggling.

Boris Johnson is, technically, a Tory MP who is a currently active member of Parliament and has put on his clothes correctly and is standing on his feet (though if you look at him, that is also in question), so that makes him eligible to run as leader. The hardcore Johnsonites who are still mad that he got forced out for all that serial lying and partying during Covid and so forth are likewise pissed that there is now a requirement to get 100 MPs (a little under one-third of the Tory Parliamentary contingent) to underwrite your candidacy. This is clearly an attempt to a) winnow out all the dilettantes who just want it for their CV line, and b) to focus on really the very serious clowns, who will put on their clown makeup with real dedication to clown school and graduating Magna Clown Laude. Serving the country? Hahahahha, SURELY YOU JEST, OLD BOY. PIP PIP TOODLE-O.

Said Johnsonites are mad because this means their boy might have trouble getting 100 MPs to back him, given how thoroughly he fucked up last time. The Tories aren't quite as open about their fascist ambitions as the Republicans, but they're equally contemptuous of democracy and will do absolutely anything to avoid the only sensible solution, which is calling a General Election, because they would get absolutely wiped out and they are craven power-loving hypocrites who don't want to give that up. Even if they have now run the country over, backed up the Big Brexit Bus, run it over again, and then done it a third or fourth time for good measure. So yes, given the utter depths of clownery to which they have descended, it is indeed entirely possible that not only will BoZo make a renewed run for top clown spot, he will win. God help us all.

[sourcreammachine]

TORY PARTY MANIFESTO 2024 SUMMARY

tldr: little rishi is liz truss now. words 8, 9 and 10 of the manifesto are 'covid and ukraine', so they're swinging hard on excusemaking, and it's very negativist and defensive - attacking labour and justifying their terrible government. they know they’re losing so it’s a mess in an attempt to stop their base voting reform. this is the only major manifesto whose headings are written in serif, tryna act all official and luxe

💷ECONOMY

flat-rate employee national insurance cuts from 12% to 6% over the next two financial years, allegedly cutting income taxation for a £35k/a worker by £1,350 (their numbers) BUT also giving the highest 'employee' earners this same tax-cut

trickle-down economics: keep corporation tax at extreme lows

exempt the self-employed from national insurance contributions, essentially cutting overall income taxation by a couple percent

specific, direct threat to cut benefits for 'people of working age with a disability or health condition', restrict PIP entitlements with harsher assessments, massively expand 'fit to work' status over people with mental health and mobility conditions to remove benefits from 400k people (despite the current regime leading to misery and deaths), transfer fit note responsibility from GPs to the dwp to restrict more benefits, reduce the 'claimant review' date from 18 months to 12 months without work

transition child benefit entitlements to be based on 'household' earnings rather than individual earnings

"we will not increase the number of council tax bands, undertake an expensive council tax revaluation or cut council tax discounts, as labour is currently doing in wales", preventing councils from getting more property tax revenue whilst not increasing their funding from anywhere, enabling more and more and more and more councils to shit themselves and die, letting them blame labour for "bankrupting" the councils that the central government themselves squeezed to death

ban councils doing four-day week schemes

reduce net borrowing – curious considering the unfunded nature of the manifesto proposals

increase taxes on online distribution warehouses "to help the high street" [citation needed]

"use brexit freedoms" to recategorise many 'large' businesses as 'medium', exempting them from reporting requirements and allowing them to exploit their workers more

more fucking 'freeport' special economic zones

'strengthen the commonwealth' because that's the favourite excuse of europhobic excusemakers acting like severing trade with the mainland wasn't a horrifically bad idea. india and malaysia do not give a shit about us mate and it's ridiculous to think australia and guyana could ever offer as much economic integration as the mainland can

do nothing to supervise or control the City with a specific eye to doing nothing about "fintech" and "ai"

economic commitment to continue union-busting and restricting union rights, 'continue implementing' the so-called 'minimum service levels legislation' to enable strikebreaking and mandatory scabbing

🏥PUBLIC SERVICES

continue the privatisation of the NHS but with a focus on small/medium enterprises

expand, that's right, expand the indefensible multi-academy trusts, build more indefensible 'free schools' (ie with private charters, no oversight, and public cash), expand faith schools, strengthen ofsted to be even more bureaufascistic against attacks after that headteacher's suicide

continue and enforce the ongoing propaganda push into primary schools, "we will always support teachers to uphold and promote fundamental British values"

'close university courses with the worst outcomes' [clarification needed], again, threatening the higher education sector into compliance with their whims

stick all children not in school on a register

make the NHS app a single frontend for all NHS stuff

slash the size of the civil service and 'bring quango spending under control', incorporate so-called 'ai' into the civil service [clarification needed]

🏠HOUSING

lax planning laws including environmental protections and opportunities for legal challenge, and force councils to set aside land for builders, to allow more private-finance soulless newbuild sprawl, with no new infrastructure, no new community, only house-for-sale after house-for-sale

target the building of mcmansions on inner-city brownfields

expand help-to-buy for these horrible newbuilds

restrict social housing along xenophobic and classist lines: "we will legislate for new ‘local connection’ and ‘uk connection’ tests for social housing in england, to ensure this valuable but limited resource is allocated fairly"

'reform' leaseholds and cap ground rents, not abolishing this indefensible stain

give 105 towns a pathetic £20m

🚄TRANSPORT ?

build northern powerhouse rail including Bradford Station "using money saved from HS2" and £12b more, and upgrade the east midlands mainline

lax planning restrictions on new strategic (big and polluting) roads

deliver money centrally for transport projects: £1.75b for the midlands rail hub, a pathetic £1b for buses in the north AND in the midlands, and £13b for 'local priorities' to 'cut congestion' (read: roads)

introduce a specific 'death by dangerous cycling' offence

"automated vehicles will be on British roads in the next parliament"🤮

ban low-traffic neighbourhoods except on a 'road by road basis' 'with the support of the people who live there' and create a statutory right to challenge existing LTNs

"labour’s incoherent and ideological nationalisation plan would put the trade unions in charge", ie the incoming british railways (being set up) will continue the indefensible franchise-concession system that emerged after the final collapse of the franchise system in 2020

"include measures to reform outdated working practises in the rail industry" – ie forcing through driver-only trains and other things the drivers are striking against, possibly requiring strikebreaking them

👮FORCE

"in recent months we have seen shocking increases in protests being used as a cover for extremist disruption and criminality. we cannot allow a small and vocal minority to destroy our democratic values. that is why we unveiled a new extremism definition under which certain groups that promote an ideology based on violence, hatred or intolerance will be blocked from government funding and meeting officials. we have passed tough new laws to curb disruptive protests. our public order act 2023 [ie the Bill that the kill the bill protests were trying to kill] gave the police new powers to intervene where protests cause serious disruption to communities, leading to the arrests of over 600 just stop oil and extinction rebellion protestors in London alone. we will introduce further powers to ban face coverings, pyrotechnics and climbing on war memorials. we will strengthen police powers to prevent protests or marches that pose a risk of serious disorder, by allowing police to take into account the cumulative impact of protests"

"building on our new powers for the police, we will further speed up the use and enforcement of powers to remove illegal traveller sites, while giving councils greater planning powers to prevent unauthorised development by travellers", furthering the ongoing clampdown on the civil rights of our country's GRT people

surge funding for the armed forces

deliberate target to be europe's largest arms exporter by 2030 no i am not fucking joking

sabrerattle at the 'Axis of Hostile Actors' (russia, china, iran), giving a catchy name to the other side of this little cold war of theirs

abuse the permanent un council seat as much as possible

"we will push for a two-state solution in the middle east - our long-standing position has been that we will recognise a palestinian state that is most conductive to the peace process" [oxymoronic – SEE ME]

roll out broken windows policing

mandatory minimum of life for 'most heinous murderers', prohibit parole for rapists

not enact Leveson 2 and allow the press hate speech and corruption to continue, proceed with centralised renegotiation of BBC funding with all statecapture (or the effects of the threats thereof) that may entail

half-baked national service proposal. look, they know they're gonna lose so they've come up with this faff to win over their base. all 18-year-olds (no specific enumeration given so i'm guessing it means from yer 18th birthday to 19th birthday, interfering with exams and start of uni) forced to do one weekend a month 'community volunteering', or get one of 30k places in the military (out of a typical annual cohort of 400k) for a year, so the troops get distracted from their warcrimes by being forced to do childcare lmao. the compulsion to do this is not enumerated, with one rogue minister suggesting fines could fall at the feet of the parents of these adult people. takeaway: this is total nonsense and they don't have to make it make sense so who cares

legal cap on work and family visas, screen migrants for health conditions and force them to pay if they need treatment, do the rwanda concentration camp scheme, ban asylum seekers from countries 'that don't work with us', mass deportations of illegals [clarification needed]

LEAVE THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS if it finds against the rwanda concentration camp scheme

expand the NCA with a focus on being the hostile environment

promote the imperialistic ambitions of the anglosphere and english as the cosmocratic imperial lingua franca

only 30k of the so-called 'national service' would in the military, so basically forcing the military to do daycare

commitment to continued strikebreaking and union-busting

force landlords to evict "antisocial" tenants in a 'three strikes and you're out' policy

ban mobile phones in schools

pledge for a Bad Internet Bill to restrict online content, 'carefully consider' the bertin review to implement hostile measures against pornography

🌱CLIMATE ?

build new gas power stations and accelerate oil and gas extraction in the north sea

treble offshore wind, in line with labour's proposals

invest £1b into green energy – a pathetically small amount

approve more nuclear reactors

carbon credit scheme for imports of materials

restrict the mandate of the climate change committee

force solar power stations to be a minimum distance from another solar power station 'to protect rural landscapes'

allow nimby organisations to prevent onshore wind

reverse the ultra-low emissions zone expansion

slowly work towards a deposit-return system

a new national park. a new one. a. one

🗳️DEMOCRACY ?

"we remain committed to the first past the post system for elections, maintaining the direct link with the local voter. we will not change the voting age rom 18. we will maintain rules to tackle voting fraud, including the requirement to show id"

"we believe the governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland now have the right balance of powers"

"we will bring forward legislation to reapply the entirety of the trade union act 2016 (ie restricting the rights of unions) to wales. and a welsh conservative government would reverse labour's plans to expand the senedd" [relevance - this isn't a manifesto for the senedd election]

expand the useless sticking-plaster combined authorities, give powers first to Tees Valley in bare-faced partisan corruption

🏳️‍⚧️REACTIONARY AGENDA

"biological sex is a reality. the overwhelming majority of people in this country recognise that. it has been more than a decade since the equality act was passed by a labour government. it has not kept pace with evolving interpretations and is not sufficiently clear on when it means sex and when it means gender. the next conservative government will introduce primary legislation to clarify that the protected characteristic of sex in the equality act means biological sex. this will guarantee that single sex services and single sex spaces can be provided, for example in healthcare and sports settings, to ensure women and girls are protected"

"in recent years, an increasing number of children have started questioning their gender, the consequences of which are still unknown. parents will have a right to know if their child wants to be treated as the opposite sex and schools will have to involve parents when it comes to decisions about their children"

"attempts at so-called 'conversion therapy' are abhorrent. but legislation around conversion practices is a very complex issue, with existing criminal law already offering robust protections. in light of the cass review final report, it is right that we take more time before reaching a final judgement"

"we will work to strengthen the relationship between schools and parents, including by delivering new legislation which will make clear, beyond all doubt, that parents have a right to see what their child is being taught in school [they made it bold not me] and schools must share all materials, especially on sensitive matters like relationships and sex education. this builds on the progress [citation needed] we have already made, having updated relationships, sex and health education guidance to introduce clear age-limits on what children can be taught [the rightist outrage at 'sex education for five year olds' is literally stuff like gay people exist so don't bully billy two-dads for having two dads, which is of course fucking unacceptable to the daily mosley] and guarantee the contested concept of gender identity is not taught to children [clarification needed -- or not, because the vagueness is the point, it's Section 28 two, terrorising the entire public sector into silence about anything the daily mosley might clench their pearls about]."

commitment to implement the cass review, ban the private prescription of puberty blockers, accelerate the increasing prohibition of their NHS prescription, fight 'ideologically-driven care' and follow 'evidence' (in the context of the case review meaning absolute prohibition and literal torture)

stop public sector DEI [clarification needed]

'not allow the word woman to be erased'

🤔STRAIGHT UP NON-POLICIES

a load of stuff in the manifesto, especially in the economic section, is just 'maintain funding for...', including 'maintaining' the living wage (ie without even making it legally mandatory), and do ongoing plans instituted by public sector organs that wouldn't be theirs to organise

the so-called 'triple lock plus' or 'quadruple lock': the triple lock legally mandates three possible minima for the state pension, depending on which is highest. it's currently below the tax-free personal allowance, but it is forecast to go above the current personal allowance at some point, which would mean pensioners would start paying tax on the income above the allowance. the tories have made a huge song and dance about raising the personal allowance for pensioners in line with the triple lock. George W Bush 'Mission Accomplished' energy. they're trying to present 'removing' this weird and unhelpful discrepancy as a 'tax cut', even though it is currently not a 'tax' and would be easily rectified by any incumbent government facing this situation by just raising the allowance, because all pensioners would cause a hell of a storm were the government to forget to solve the discrepancy. and it totally ignores any possibility of the personal allowance being raised anyway

prevent first-time buyers from having to pay stamp duty! except there's been a 'temporary' lien for years so this is nothing

'maintain the ban on prisoners voting' is listed as an actual policy