[Politics] Amber Rudd has resigned

JC Footy Genius said:

Oh deary dear ...

May Promotes Anti-EU Former Banker, Shifting the Brexit Balance

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...-remainer-turned-leaver-is-new-home-secretary

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Thunder Bolt said:

Just another hypocrite who changes their mind with the weather.

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Westdene Seagull said:

I'm so glad you have such an open minded view of the world.

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The Clamp said:

The Tory party are nothing more than the political wing of the wealthy elite. They have only rich people's interests in mind. Scum, the lot of them.

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So Amber Rudd has resigned as Home Secretary. It was inevitable when Theresa May said she had full confidence in her – it’s always a sure sign when the PM expresses ‘full confidence’ in a minister during times of crisis that they’ll be gone within the week.

She’s been replaced by Sajid Javid, significantly further to the right of the party than Amber Rudd, and a hard Brexiteer, even though he tried to hedge his bets by campaigning to remain. As Communities Secretary, he was universally despised by councils throughout the country, of all political colours, especially after he tried to blame all councils for the Grenfell Tower fire, and shifted all responsibility away from government. His unapologetic support for austerity and huge cuts to local government and adult social care in particular has made him few friends, and local government generally will be glad to see the back of him.

So whatever you think of Amber Rudd, this is a shift to the right in the Tory Cabinet and is going to be bad news for anyone looking for a more compassionate approach from the Home Office. This is the rise of the Borisonians – in the words of Neil Kinnock (not someone I quote often!): “I warn you not to be ordinary, I warn you not to be young, I warn you not to fall ill, and I warn you not to grow old.” The Tory Party that’s now emerging is not a pretty sight, unless you’re rich, British, and don’t care about anyone less fortunate.

As for the impact Amber Rudd’s resignation will have here in Hastings & Rye, it’s difficult to say. Her reputation is now damaged, more because of her admitted lack of ‘competence’ rather than for not telling the truth or for her attitude to immigration (which is enlightened compared to most Tory MPs). I’m sure I remember the existence of immigration removal targets being in the news a few years ago, so not being on top of whether they still existed was a bit of a slip-up, to say the least, for a Home Secretary. However, she will have more time to campaign back here, so we could well be seeing more of her.

But will she stand for parliament again at all? My guess is that will rather depend of whether she’s rehabilitated quickly and ends up back in the Cabinet after a pause for reflection on the back benches. She won’t want to be out of the limelight forever, she’s too ambitious, and clever – she’d rather develop her career elsewhere. It will also depend on what happens to Theresa May, and whether she survives the Brexit deal that, inevitably, no-one will wholeheartedly support. But neither Theresa May nor Amber Rudd really fit with the hard-right ideology that’s emerging in the Tory Party. There are interesting times ahead.

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The Clamp said:

The Tory party are nothing more than the political wing of the wealthy elite. They have only rich people's interests in mind. Scum, the lot of them.

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Chicken Run said:

You should move to another country?

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Westdene Seagull said:

Labour really are no better .....

Lord Sainsbury worth £400m (#3)

Labour peer and ex-minister, though previously in the SDP. His fortune is mainly (£350m) in shares in the family supermarket business. He was a big donor to the Labour Party under Brown, but now channels his money into Progress.

Lord Grantchester worth £80m (#9)

Labour peer. Inherited much of the Littlewoods football pools and retailing fortune. He owns extensive property in Cheshire, Dumfries and Galloway, Westminster, Yorkshire and Dallas, Texas.

Lord Drayson worth £75m (#10=)

Labour peer and ex-minister. Made his fortune in pharmaceuticals. Since losing his ministerial post (defence procurement), in 2010, he has immersed himself in motor sports.

Tony Blair worth £30m (#14)

Ex Labour prime minister. Has made his fortune more quickly than the rest, from dispensing advice to companies, sovereign wealth funds and governments (including Kuwait and Kazakhstan), and employs about 150 staff at his Mayfair HQ. He can earn up to £200,000 for making a speech to top up his £70,000 prime ministerial pension and pay the running costs of his valuable property portfolio.

Margaret Hodge worth £18m (#15)

Labour MP, former minister and currently a select committee chair. Her fortune isn largely her inherited stake in the steel trading company founded by her German Jewish refugee father, Hans Oppenheimer.

Shaun Woodward worth £15m (#16)

One-time Tory turned Labour MP and cabinet minister. What the Times treat as his wealth is really his wife’s inheritance (she’s another Sainsbury, her father being ex-Tory MP, Tim Sainsbury) topped up by some astute moves in the property market, having recently sold homes in St James’s and New York for £5.7m and £11.5m respectively, leaving them with just six properties (in the Alps, Mustique, the south of France, Cirencester, a London flat and St Helens – the constituency).

Geoffrey Robinson worth £10m (#17=)

Former Paymaster General and still a Labour MP. Former CEO of Jaguar cars and still a non-executive director of Paiton Engineering. His fortune is not really derived from his buisness interests many of which the Times describes as failures although he, no doubt, never expected to make anything out of either the New Statesman or Coventry FC, nor from the £373,000 loan to Peter Mandelson which cost him his ministerial career. He inherited £12m from Belgian entrepreneur, Joska Bourgeois, which is what enables him to own 168 acres in Tuscany, a Park Lane penthouse and “one of Surrey’s finest houses” – a Lutyens mansion in 50 acres.

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The Clamp said:

More whataboutery. I have no faith in the Labour Party either. Useless tossers to a man.

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Westdene Seagull said:

My point being that EVERY political party is only in it for the wealthy and powerful.

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The Clamp said:

whataboutery

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Chicken Run said:

I’ve noticed two phrases creep into the NSC phrases that everyone should use on a daily basis book!

The other swiveleyed/s

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Sussex Nomad said:

I'm not a political animal, I care very little, but I do know when something isn't right, and Corbyn is not right.

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Herr Tubthumper said:

So, you admit you know and care little.....but somehow realise Corbyn isn’t right. Well argued

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Sussex Nomad said:

Can you give me a point?

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Sussex Nomad said:

Would you vote to put them in charge of our country? Dianne Abbott, there's a start, could you entrust her to looking after our police? The Labour party of today are the Labour party of 40 years ago, inept and left wing, it'd be like voting in (on the far right) the BNP or whatever they call themselves nowadays. We are sadly, right now, a one party vote. You just cannot put the tick in the commie box. We would regress to the 70s on day one. How the f**k that bloke has managed to be Labour leader is totally beyond me. I was always a bit scared of Tony Benn becoming Labour leader when I was a kid, this eclipses it. We cannot trust this man at all. He is Michael Foot and then some. I'm not a political animal, I care very little, but I do know when something isn't right, and Corbyn is not right.

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The Merry Prankster said:

I know very little about ornithology and care even less about it so I don't go on message boards and write about it.

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Herr Tubthumper said:

I’m afraid not, nul points. Must try harder.

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Sussex Nomad said:

So, what you are saying is, I can't talk about politics whether or not I care about it? Very good comment, very little substance. Ornithology doesn't set our taxes.

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