Raja Clavata

That's a really ill formed example. Are you suggesting the IMF are a part of the remainer spin establishment? Of course our employment figures are good, Brexit resulted in a ton of our workforce returning to their native EU countries. Compounded by global skills shortage and mass resignation. I'm pretty sure any UK resident who is able and willing to work can find a job. Relative earnings are another measure of prosperity, have you checked how we fayre compared to other nations in that regard? Then there's the topic of productivity but I don't expect you'll enter into a "debate" about how productive the French are, for example, compared to us... So, it's because of migrants, OK. You actually thought the illegal immigrant issue was going to improve as a result of Brexit, like really!? Net zero, what are these burdens you refer to and how do they impact GDP? That's some bubble you're living in fella...

Talking of economics, we’re now predicted to have the lowest growth of all G7 economies next year, of all the major global economies only Russia is predicted to fair worse. What’s the cause of that I wonder… Good job we took back that control 😉

She is going to be PM. After her "win" against Mourdant yesterday she tweeted that "she is going to hit the ground" which was later updated to "hit the ground running". Like you say, God help us! GSTQ

One potential scenario I can see playing out is Trustless crashing and burning in record time with Boris making a comeback. Indeed, the cynic in me might even go as far as suggesting that is precisely what has been engineered thus far.

I might be able to bring myself to vote Tory at the next GE under Sunak, can't see how I'll do anything other than continue to abstain if it's the other one...

I'm with you on this aspect.

So it boils down to the Conservative Party Members choosing which dressing they prefer, or dislike the least, to accompany their poo sandwich. That said, I really fear it could be a disaster under Liz Trustless...

The more pertinent question is would Putin have invaded Ukraine if Biden had stated that the US and or others would assist the Ukrainians. Instead Biden basically provided an open invite for Putin to do exactly what he ended up doing. A follow-up question, which I believe Rewulf and others have asked before is why did Biden make that statement. Fully aware the above facts may sit uncomfortably with die-hard fans of the US...

The reference to billions is the entire PPE debacle. https://www.transparency.org.uk/track-and-trace-uk-PPE-procurement-corruption-risk-VIP-lane There are multiple sources on this online but I think you've said before that you don't follow posted links, so, in summary: Key findings High-risk contracts Contracts awarded to companies with political connections: Twenty-four PPE contracts worth £1.6 billion were awarded to those with known political connections to Conservative Party. Three contracts worth £536 million went to politically connected companies for testing related services. Contracts awarded without competition: Between February and November 2020, 98.9 percent of COVID-19 related contracts by value (£17.8 billion) were awarded without any form of competition, many without adequate justification. Contracts awarded to companies with no track record of supplying goods or services: Fourteen companies incorporated in 2020 received contracts worth more than £620 million, of which 13 contracts totalling £255 million went to 10 firms that were less than 60 days old. Losing the money trail Whitehall has faced understandable resource challenges, but our study catalogues the woefully inadequate arrangements for enabling scrutiny over the use of taxpayers’ money. Contracts awarded to politically connected companies were more likely to be published late. Details of 93 percent (28) of the 30 contracts awarded to politically connected companies were published late, compared to 70 percent (688) of the 970 without. Seven of these late contracts awarded to politically connected suppliers went unpublished for more than 100 days. Seventy two percent (711) of COVID-related contracts awarded during our sample period, worth £13.3 billion, were reported after the 30-day legal deadline, with £7.4 billion of this total reported more than 100 days after the contract was awarded. In comparison, on average it took Ukraine less than a day to publish information on 103,263 COVID-19 contracts after their award during the same period.

Think we're talking cross purposes, I'm talking about the billions paid to companies that had not even existed prior to the pandemic. (tax payer money passed to "cohorts" of the decision makers based on nepotism). Again, cross purposes here. No need to go over it again though. Added a bit more context on this from a personal perspective per ShootingEgg's request.

Some examples: In 2018 I was invited to re-join the US Corporation I voluntarily left in 2016 - meeting the CEO f2f in Michigan, US - he told me Brexit was the final nail in the coffin for UK Engineering in the Group, so if I wanted to go back I had to choose between German or US residency as they planned to close the UK engineering operation (== less UK jobs). Prior to Brexit, the UK division of my new / current employer (large multinational with ~350,000 employees globally) was able to leverage Horizon Europe and other EU funding, we are no longer able to do this and this has had a significant impact on the UK R&D funding and therefore the UK headcount budget (== less UK jobs). At a Group level, despite the UK division being seen as a key player in support of critical systems and infrastructure with skills relevant to growth within the Group e.g. UK Air traffic control, there are lower levels of Group investment allocated to the UK than before Brexit (== less UK jobs). Despite being a Group employee with a global role, I'm somewhat "tarred with the same brush" as the majority who voted Brexit. Some of it is "only banter" but I'm not the only UK based employee with a Group role that feels there are negative implications with us being seen as "guilty by association" (== less global opportunities for UK based employees within the Group). My work involves a reasonable amount of travel, I have already detailed some of the issues with passport control based on needing to take the "rest of world" channel upon arrival in all EU countries elsewhere on this forum. In some cases now I have to travel the day before to mitigate delays - this has been cited as a first world problem by some here, but it has a significant impact on my "free time" and home life (== personal impact on quality of home life).. Basically the rest of the world, apart perhaps from Ukraine - but that's nothing to do with Brexit, basically see us as less relevant as a nation on the global stage than we were prior to Brexit.

I'd add the multi billion PPE scam with seemingly no accountability anywhere to be seen. The thing is Boris did do precisely want he wanted and aspects of both his personal actions and those of his government have been found to be unlawful. I guess normal is a subjective thing, many outsiders found Brexit far from normal, for example. I've noticed negative impacts of Brexit, both from a personal and professional perspective. I am yet to see any positives frankly but am hopeful they may become apparent in due course. Frankly I'll take any positives I can get. I appreciate you conceding that you're yet to notice anything different in relation to Brexit.

Thanks, but I don't need you to fix anything for me. So, you've provided no evidence and gone off on a tangent about some people blaming everything on Brexit, classy. This notion that everything that went OK / good is due to Boris and anything less so is somebody else's wrong (scapegoating) or due to COVID / the EU / Macron / <insert whatever> simply has to stop.

What evidence would you cite in supporting this? The flip side of this is that COVID may well have temporarily hidden the true horrors of Brexit. I'm not proposing one over the other, my personal view is that COVID trumped pretty much everything.

yep, on official government business as far as I can tell

She's the Boris continuum, albeit slightly degraded in some aspects, I'm now at the point of anyone but her. Just seen that one of Mourdant's supporters has had his whip removed - how low will this lot go...

Indeed. Quite sure it's also true of Northern Cyprus, been over-run by Russians for a while now. I was in Madrid over the weekend and a fair few there too.

The black female candidate is about as anti-woke as you can get...

No words...

Fully concur! Indeed, I've written previously on this thread about avoidance of "corner cases" where things can escalate very quickly and in ways previously deemed unimaginable. On balance, I suspect any wrong-doing or attempt at wrong-doing at Putin would be an internal job but for the reasons highlighted might be ruled out as too risky in the big scheme of things.

It was a throw away comment John. Not to be taken too seriously (like a lot of the posts on this thread...)

As far as I'm aware, it's not a case of flights out of Russia banned per se but that there's a ban on Russian airlines being able to land / operate out of most nations in the world at the moment. So, if Iran is willing to accept a visit by Putin then there's nothing much that can be done about it by NATO, Ukraine or anyone else. That said, if ever there was a good moment for a missile to go astray then... Edit: not just airlines, Russian registered aircraft of all types

So there will now be no debate. Maybe they did a deal, maybe they were told to button it but either way that removes further public scrutiny from the process by, unfortunately, most likely the two candidates that will head off against each other.

Too late, oh the irony...

Mordaunt over Trustless all day long.