The next Tory leader

[Archie_tect]

Oh, boy... Hunt's threatening China with sanctions.

You know, the same China who make pretty much everything we use these days, the same China will be desperate for a post-Brexit trade deal with.

I'm getting the words, "empty threat".

They're both so equally inept and dangerous to have in any public office, I find it difficult to imagine a worse position for the UK to be in... life mimicking fiction ['Years']

 

[Unkraut]

Oh, boy... Hunt's threatening China with sanctions.

You know, the same China who make pretty much everything we use these days, the same China will be desperate for a post-Brexit trade deal with.

I'm getting the words, "empty threat".

I haven't yet read a paperback on China (making me a world's leading authority on the country, its culture institutions and history), but I wonder if the Chinese have entirely forgotten the humiliation heaped on them in the days of the British Empire? The opium wars etc. A long time ago now, but sometimes these things fester on in the popular imagination.

 

[Crackle]

Our best hope for a GE and 2nd referendum remains Johnson. Hunt may be given a chance and has already proved he's totally useless with the NHS.

 

[Spinney]

Our best hope for a GE and 2nd referendum remains Johnson. Hunt may be given a chance and has already proved he's totally useless with the NHS.

I tend to agree - Boris as the worst for the Tory party and hence the best for the country. As you say, Boris doesn't have even the faint air of competence that Hunt manages to convey.

 

[Unkraut]

All the problems that we face and fox hunting is near the top of Hunt's agenda

I remember my dad saying something similar when they brought the ban in in the first place. Strange priorities.

 

[Rusty Nails]

I remember my dad saying something similar when they brought the ban in in the first place. Strange priorities.

I doubt whether it is anywhere on Hunt's personal list of priorities.

He knows it is probably the sort of thing that is quite high on the list of around 160,000 people, together with blue passports.

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

I doubt whether it is anywhere on Hunt's personal list of priorities.

He knows it is probably the sort of thing that is quite high on the list of around 160,000 people, together with blue passports.

Except he's gone to ground over the issue....

Traditional Tories were horrified when Labour passed a foxhunting ban, and amongst party members repeal is almost certainly a popular cause. But amongst the public at large the prospect of the law being changed to legalise a sport that involves dogs tearing foxes to pieces is toxic. During the 2017 general election campaign the Conservatives were surprised when what they thought was a tame restatement of their 2015 election position (allowing a free vote on repeal) became a major issue of social media, mobilising many voters to support anti-Tory candidates. Hunt is pitching himself as the leadership candidate most able to win an election for the party by appealing to floating voters, and so having this around his neck was a problem. One Tory MP backing Hunt described it as “political suicide”.​

And so this morning Hunt clarified his position. Without entirely retracting what he told the Telegraph, he said the law on foxhunting would not change because he could not envisage there ever being a majority in favour in the Commons. Asked about what he said to the Telegraph, he told the Today programme:​

Well, I think this is just because I was giving a straight answer to a straight question. But the law is not going to change on fox hunting. There isn’t a majority in the House of Commons, and I don’t see there ever being one. I was just restating the position in our manifesto from 2017 that there should be a free vote if it ever looked like that majority would change. But it would not be my priority as prime minister.​

Hunt’s analysis is probably correct. Almost all the MPs in the Commons who support foxhunting are Conservatives, but there are plenty of Tories who would vote against repeal of the ban and the working assumption amongst campaigners is that there would have to be a very large Conservative majority in the Commons for the restoration of foxhunting to have any chance of passing.​

 

[Diogenes]

I'd say it's all Bread & Circuses but most circuses are foreign nowadays so they'll not be keen on letting them in after Brexit.

So just bread then.

 

[Unkraut]

So just bread then.

Post-Brexit it will have to be cake for most people ...

 

[Diogenes]

Post-Brexit it will have to be cake for most people ...

Or dry, wholemeal Hovis

 

[Dec66]

Or dry, wholemeal Hovis

Or hardtack.

 

[Spinney]

From the Guardian's live feed, reporting on Johnson:

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

From the Guardian's live feed, reporting on Johnson:
View attachment 473926

Johnson is committing the longest, loudest suicide note in Tory history. Meanwhile, Labour is doing something similar with soft, flushable paper.

 

[C R]

From the Guardian's live feed, reporting on Johnson:
View attachment 473926

I think you missed a few thousand emojis.

 

[Salty seadog]

Our best hope for a GE and 2nd referendum remains Johnson. Hunt may be given a chance and has already proved he's totally useless with the NHS.

Depends on what the brief was, deepening private sector involvement is the tory way...... Make it look bad enough that it 'just had to have private involvement'