I don't think the House of Lords is anachronistic in the slightest, but it does require significant reform. It's basic function is to act as a safety valve against the House of Commons. As such, its members should be apolitical. This means that they should not be appointed by election as this inevitably brings politics in to it. Neither should life peers be amongst its members as these are generally political appointments. The effective replacement of hereditary peers with life peers by the Blair government was wrong because, as you say, the ruling party can just create loads of new Lords. So, with no election, how do you appoint its members? The obvious answer is hereditary peers. They are more likely to have political views that aren't aligned to a particular party and less likely to be influenced by party policy (anyone who says "Ooh but they're all Tories" is wrong) than life peers. Plus, if we're going to have hereditary peers, they should be providing a service to the country for the privilege. The only other option would be random selection of the public, a bit like jury service. You'd need a minimum term of at least a year though and you can't expect people to take that length of time out of their normal lives and jobs and they wouldn't have enough time to get settled into the role. In addition to hereditary peers I would include faith leaders (of all the major faiths present in this country), senior members of the medical profession, senior members of the armed forces, senior people from education, and from the arts. Plus any similar areas that I can't think of right now. There should be annual training for them to support them in the role, although I'm not entirely sure what form that should take, and should be required to take relevant field trips to understand relevant issues. You can't have an elected upper house, it defeats the purpose of it. And certainly not with the state that politics is in at this present moment in time.
Before Johnson leaving list there was 778 members, so after the general election add to, Sunaks list, plus incoming new leaders list, we will be looking at way in excess of 800. If all members turned up on one day @£300 that would be £236,400 and that doesn't cover their entitlements. Absolutely outrageous imo. Too many by far and reform is required and required very quickly.
I voted to stay in the EU and was concerned about the levels of immigration into the Uk at the time. "Brexit" has made it 10 times worse.
In the May before the vote in 2016, the immigration figures came in at about 650,000 and that was the first time I thought, oh ****, we might vote for Brexit. I voted to remain but that figure was so high and concerning. History could have turned out differently if the figure was 250,000 or something like that. Even 400,000.
I can understand most of the reasons why people voted to leave the EU but I can never understand how anyone could think that it would reduce immigration. Every EU agreement we had to protect us was scrapped overnight and we were left to sort it ourselves. I said as soon as the result was announced that the camps in Calais would move to Dover, the migrants have now swapped their tents in France for hotels and prison hulks in the UK.
The option now exists for a government to stop it. It'll take a lot of political capital, money and there would be some very uncomfortable headlines, but if there's the will to do it, it's achievable.
Amazing that intelligent people claimed it would stop the immigrants and fell for the ruse ... ... yet somehow people from 'third world countries' didn't fall for it for a second
Perhaps those people were "unaware" it was illegal to come here. Perhaps the "guidance was followed at all times" by them. And maybe, just maybe they thought smuggling themselves into the UK was a "work event"
Keir Starmer used to sell ice creams illegally in France too many pretend journalists if this sort of nonsense is newsorthy.
Credit to the chancellor and the banks on agreeing a 12 month stop on repossesions. Nobody needs a return to 2008 and the jump we saw then. Some sensible measures announced today.
It's just waffle tbh. Most lenders won't even think about proceedings until a third month has been missed and then .... "Your lender will have to follow several steps to apply for a repossession order, which can take up to nine months if the order is successful." The voluntary agreement to look at allowing people to extend terms and go to interest only has always been there. It's only the credit score issue that's new.
Perhaps. But the last time we saw interest rates this high, in 2008, we saw a doubling of repossessions to nearly 50000 a year over a 2 year period. At the time I was stressed and I would have appreciated a govt intervention like we have seen today. In 2022 we were down to c3000 with low interest rates. Defaults will always be higher when interests rates are higher. Lots of people are stressed, if all today is an announcement of default rights, at least someone has done it. All I have seen from labour and the media over the last few days is pronouncements about the so called 'Tory Mortgage Timebomb', and how labour would solve it.
Sunak came in with the sword of truth and the shield on integrity ... ... but, after what I've seen this week, he's totally failed. I thought there'd be be a hung parliament but this is such a mess we've barely moved on from Truss. I think the Tories will be decimated and people will be out for revenge ... ... this government is absolutely rotten. There isn't even a cabinet, it's Sunak and Hunt. Can anyone name a minister who's actually doing anything ... ... Braverman is absolutely pathetic and she's the best of them
His latest job is levelling up minister. We've just seen the levelling up express trains cancelled and the Blyth battery plant project kicked into the weeds. But, to be fair he does make a decent attempt to back each new PM who gives him a job. He must be doing something other than that though so you're right.
