The Kraken

Technically, yes. Realistically, absolutely not in the majority of cases. You would have to be really engaged in local politics to know what your local MP is all about and how they’ll go about it. Given how much the main parties whip their MPs to just vote per party policies, there’s not too many Dennis Skinners around any more who vote with their principles first. I’d not trust any MP aligned to a major party to vote their own wishes first, they’ll get booted out before that. It would be great if every single vote in parliament were down to the MP but it’s a sad reality that we are miles away from that, and have been for ages. I’m ok with it only in that I can’t do much about it.

An extremely simplistic response would be…..If you voluntarily leave the party, it’s a by election. If you get the whip taken away, you can stay put as an MP but only as an independent. Granted, if the “independent” does a Jenrick and gets themself sacked then they’re just going to follow the line of the party they want to join, so it’s a bit of a worthless move. So I’ll just remain being Peter O’hanrahanrahan, I don’t like it but I’ll have to go along with it.

In general I agree with you. Duck makes a reasonable point though, it’s not quite that cut and dried. But I do believe that if you voluntarily leave the party to defect to another then it should trigger a by-election. But I’m sure there would still be more loopholes to be found.

I had a quick skim of their forum, they largely reckon have zero chance of affording him unless they get promoted. It also relies on what their injured keeper does when he gets back, they seem to really rate him but think he might be destined for a higher level one way or the other.

Ok, must have both been in injury time, I checked just before the 90 were up and it was zero at that point.

It’s only qpr but Stoke didn’t allow a shot on target until injury time. Thats the type of defence Baz needs to play behind.

Todays google answer to “what is a Marxist fascist.” A "Marxist fascist" is a contradiction in terms, as Marxism and Fascism are fundamentally opposing ideologies: Marxism aims for classless, international worker solidarity against capitalism, while Fascism, from a Marxist perspective, is a brutal dictatorship of finance capital designed to crush socialist movements and preserve capitalist power through extreme nationalism, militarism, and suppression of class struggle, often mobilizing the desperate middle class against workers. While some regimes called themselves "Marxist" (like Stalinist Russia) and were accused of fascism (or vice versa) by opponents, classic Marxist theory sees fascism as capitalism's violent tool against the working class, not a form of socialism

Call me old fashioned if you will, but I’ll probably wait another 3 years until deciding where my vote goes in the general. The locals are very different and are often used to protest at something. In the local elections of 2023 the greens got a candidate elected in Portswood when a Labour clean sweep was expected, a major factor of that was a protest against the disastrous bus gate where Labour were perceived to have done very little to serve the wishes of local residents affected.

Yes, it’s definitely funny that a thread started 4 years ago about a 16 year old would be bumped to update on his progress. Very funny indeed.

And somehow has the gall to call others intolerant. Genuine self-reflection bypass.

This is exactly it as far as I’m concerned. A really good local MP is one who makes themselves available as much as possible for their constituents and gets fully involved with local matters. The problem comes in that it’s a different skill set to be a good local MP and to be a good minister. Ministers should probably be paid more, but then the ladder to becoming one requires you for the most part to start at local level. So it’s a difficult balance. People like Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer weren’t put off of getting into politics because the money was bad. But I doubt either of them were particularly devoted local MPs, they always had aspirations for ministerial roles. There’s a place for that and also one for someone who just wants to spend their time locally. So it’s a difficult balance. I would want my MP to be active in the community and to be available for meeting constituents by appointment, then acting on the issues that they can. And to have a small staff who can triage all that (rather than just use their budget for employing family members). I don’t think that job role requires a leap in funding from what it already is.

Loan with an option to buy, by the looks of it.

Gary Oldman as Jackson Lamb, Slow Horses. Tom Hardy as Alfie Solomons, Peaky Blinders. Martin Sheen as Jed Bartlet, The West Wing.

Christ. Peretz made Bazunu look good there.

Just saw the goal on TNT’s roundup programme.