James 🇬🇧

Blue Labour | First-class IR & Politics BA | Public Policy MSc
🇬🇧🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿

[Labourball @labourball]

Hang on, wasn't this your attack ad at the start of Labour conference... two days ago?

[Survation. @Survation]

With the Triple Lock reform set out accurately and the savings hypothecated to a National Care Service, a clear majority back it:

64% support it and 15% oppose: net +49.

Support outnumbers opposition in every age group, including those most affected:
-> 55-64: 61% support, 16% oppose
-> 65+: 55% support, 27% oppose

5/6

[Lord Keynes @Lord_Keynes3]

The growth was a result of parasitic finance capitalism, which destroyed Britain as a manufacturing nation. Thatcher also caused the worst unemployment since the 1930s.

[Despotic Inroad @DespoticInroad]

This is why the IEA/Adam Smith guys are deluding themselves thinking we can “reindustrialise” with some deregulation/N. Sea drilling.

The Chinese have spent 50yrs doing aggressive industrial policy. The Americans are abandoning 50yrs of free trade orthodoxy to protect their industries behind tariff walls.

The idea that the UK can rebuild a tired manufacturing sector with some supply-side reforms is a fantasy. We’ll need a heavy dose of upgraded dirigisme implemented by an agile, lean state with an empowered executive/improved capacity & freedom of action following reform of JR, ECHR relationship + stripping out of QUANGOcracy:
👉High levels of public investment, facilitated by BoE, if necessary
👉Leveraging public procurement to support/rebuild domestic producers
👉Shift of public spending from benefits/pensions to capital investment/infrastructure/R&D. Move to contributory/social insurance rather than means-tested welfare/pensions model
👉Mobilise pension funds to invest in strategic, domestic industries
👉Wholesale tax reform to shift revenue burden away from productive work/patient & productive investment towards unproductive asset wealth, land, real estate, short-term speculative investments etc.
👉Energy independence/abundance
👉Targeted protectionism/Capital controls to re-domesticate & tame footloose, globalised nature of British capital

The whole state apparatus would have to be used to redirect & steer money towards key, essential sectors that are core to national resilience/autonomy. In the short-term that might feel like we’re living poorer, because it’s about a shift from day-to-day consumption to production + investment: fewer high street coffee options, more gigafactories; fewer choices on Deliveroo, more industrial robots; fewer competitive iPhone/car finance deals, more advanced materials labs + mass transit networks.

[Raven @Ravvenrotth]

If this girl was brown and bombed by USA or Israel, there would be worldwide outrage. But she's just a Ukrainian girl, and her country is bombed by russia, so no one cares. Macklemore and ms Rachel too busy posting about Palestine to notice russian genocide of Ukrainians

[YouGov @YouGov]

SNAP POLL / By 48% to 28%, Britons support Andy Burnham's proposal to change the triple lock in order to help fund part of a national care service

[The Labour Party @UKLabour]

In 1945, Labour built the common good.

We had the bravery to make change. We've done it before and we'll do it again.

[James 🇬🇧 @james_north4]

'Why is it always pensioners who are asked to be the first to make sacrifices?'

This has got to be hell. We all died in 2020 and this is hell. What is Jenrick going on about? Time to give his head a wobble.

[Robert Jenrick @RobertJenrick]

It’s official: Andy Burnham wants to cut your pension.

It’s just mean.

Why is it always pensioners who are asked to be the first to make sacrifices?

We didn’t hear a peep from Burnham on cutting the benefits bill, foreign aid or net zero subsidies.

But that’s not all. Burnham said he was being honest but what he didn’t say was there was a gaping black hole in his numbers.

Hitting pensioners will only get him 20% of what he needs. He’ll need £17 billion more in taxes.

Coincidentally, £17bn is the same amount as levying a 10% death tax on every single person who dies. It’s a double whammy on pensioners.

Reform will make different choices. We’ll be on your side instead.

[Restoration @leftrestoration]

Unless you are one of the many millions of people who worked in a dignified and important job that was shipped abroad in the last generation. None of the commentariat would understand. None of them suffered.

[David Lawrence @dc_lawrence]

The PM is expected to signal an end to the triple lock today. But what are the options for reform, and how much money do they save?

@BritishProgress (namely, @matthewgstubbs) has made a tool to compare the different ideas on the table.

For instance, you can compare @timleunig's '5-year triple lock' with @resfoundation's 'smoothed triple lock' proposal (originally proposed by @TorstenBell and @lauracgardiner) to see that they each would save around £60bn by 2047, and deliver an annual state pension of around £27k (nominal).

As you can see, the amount of money that can be saved – particularly over a longer time-horizon, is enormous.

[Tim (totally unremarkable and officially stubborn) @forwardnotback]

This passage of the speech is incredible

[John & Margaret @ukboomers]

They're doing WHAT to the triple lock? Nearly fell over the rail of the upper deck of my boat when I saw the news

[LBC @LBC]

"Wow. Now there's a moment..."

Michael Gove jokes that if Andy Burnham abandons the pension triple lock then he'll campaign for the Labour Party.

[Politics For You @PoliticoForYou]

BREAKING 🚨🚨🚨

Surrey couple “apoplectic with rage” over Labour’s triple lock betrayal.

John & Linda claim they may be forced to sell one of their 4 properties if Burnham is not stopped.

[Anna Ridgway @annaroseridgway]

The triple lock is not something promised to pensioners their entire working lives. It was introduced in 2011.

Removing it is not breaking any promise.

If anyone has any claim to say it has been promised to them, it is my generation. But my generation are the ones who are not going to get any state pension if we don’t scrap the triple lock soon.

[PigginTeaBreak (Jude) @_PigginTeaBreak]

NO ONE has paid their dues, half the welfare budget goes to pensioners who’ve statistically taken out almost double what they’ve put in.

[James 🇬🇧 @james_north4]

Christ.

[Jacqueline Pond @chiefcashier]

@jhansonradio Is he hell he wants pensioners to live in poverty no idea why he’s knifing them suppose if they die from starvation & hypothermia then the cost to NHS and Social care will go down. If he genuinely cares he needs to up the basic tax allowance that’ll help all those on low incomes

[James Hanson @jhansonradio]

Calling pensioners “the poorest in our society” is just factually wrong.

They are the richest generation in British history. 1 in 4 are millionaires.

Yes, some still live in poverty - but so do many working age people whose taxes subsidise the triple lock.

[James 🇬🇧 @james_north4]

1000 more years to Labour

[Beth Rigby @BethRigby]

💥BREAK: Burnham says he will adjust triple lock from 2030. In April 2030. State pension will rise instead by prices or 2.5%. Say change will generate ‘significant savings’, to be put into national care service

[Tharries @TharriesYT]

Frankly I'm just glad we're finally having a conversation on where most welfare actually goes (spoiler alert it's not the demographics most of the media want you to think it is)