Off Topic Politics Thread

This would be Sunak's Poll Tax, if it had any chance of actually happening, which hopefully it doesn't.

 

I think Sweden, Norway and Denmark do as well. It's unlikely to happen here, I agree that it is electioneering in this case but it could add a different dimension to some people's lives. I'm honestly not sure.

 

The biggest problem is that the Armed Forces are nowhere near prepared for this kind of scheme, it needs massive funding and a huge increase in personnel to run.

Also its probably a hard enough job when you have people who want to be there (many of whom give up on the Armed Forces because of woeful outsourced recruitment), bring in a bunch of pissed off, apathetic 18 year olds against their will and it is going to be a drain.

 

It’s not just the talk about conscription that is being spouted. The report I read said that if not conscripted into the forces they would be made to do “voluntary” work for the NHS, Fire Service, Police, or building flood defences, one weekend every month.
They seem to be talking about some form of enforced slavery.

 

I don’t mind the idea of some kind of social endeavour. But this is just a desperate final swing of a flailing fist as the Tory party are falling back onto floor of the ring. It is not going to be a knockout blow… unless Rishi hooks himself around the ear.

 

Which of course means that 18 year olds will not be able to work weekends for a year and will now have to do something they might have been paid to do before for free.

I mean the Conservative's hatred of the young really deserves to see that party die, they are the key reason that the country is being handed over to the next generation in a worse situation than they found it.

 

And note that I would assume civil sanctions for refusing could surely only take the form of appearing on your record and make getting a job as a young person harder. And it’s not like we can afford to be turning away potential workers

 

Not a bad idea at all. It would probably take the army to prise their phones out of their hands.

Even in the unlikely situation of the Tories getting re-elected, it will never happen. I don't know why any leader prior to a GE would even say it.
It sounds like a caricature of retired general from Tunbridge Wells writing to the Telegraph, "what the youth of today need is a good spell in the army".
It's not just the youth themselves but many parents from all walks of life wouldn't be happy with their love ones being conscripted. As in other countries it wouldn't all be served in the military but many would, there would be uproar.
For whatever reason and rightly or wrongly, there is not the sense of duty or patriotism that many countries who operate this system have in their society.

But as I said above, it will never happen. A much better idea would be to make them all Saints supporters, that would toughen them up.

 

To have a sense of duty and patriotism the country needs to offer you something in return. It hasn’t for a long time. The social contract is broken. Younger people can’t afford houses and can’t really afford families. House prices, bills, childcare - all astronomical. Note the latter is enormous compared to most European countries including those that have those schemes

Pensions are going through the floor and the age to get them is increasing. Public services don’t work

It’s not a surprise that young people wouldn’t want to do it. And it is young people on the left and the (far) right. None of them are up for conscription

I appreciate and acknowledge some of the claimed benefits. But to achieve them it would need buy in that isn’t going to happen

Tobias Ellwood was dodging this point and arrogantly dismissing the person who raised it (and deliberately winding her up I think) and was trying to seemingly claim it was circular in that doing this would allow some of the issues I mentioned to be resolved. That isn’t going to happen. You need buy in from the start. Carrot and not stick. Not least because the stick is expensive and/or impossible. Or could cause even more workforce problems

 

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The bots are cranking up for the election.

 

How many people are really going to read a tweet in favour of sunak and change their mind? Even leaving aside some are from people with polish and Mexican flags in their bios

 

Trust the process sounds like something a football fan would say when they're backing their manager or owner

 

And for today’s latest gift in the war against working people and the young we have….

The Quadruple Lock!

When will the media start screeching about where the money is coming for this one I wonder.

 

Wow they must have some really bad polling numbers coming out of the older demographics. Because this seems more like an attempt to win people over rather than retain the

 

Their platform under Sunak is all damage-mitigation as far as I can see. They're going to lose the election. They're going to lose the election badly. At this point they're merely trying to keep enough support with their core demographics to avoid the sort of complete annihilation that might take them several cycles to recover from. And yeah, that means a lot of nonsense culture war stuff paired with appealing almost exclusively to middle-class pensioners and bank executives on economic issues.

Doesn't seem to be going great, though.

Edit: I will say that I didn't have Jeremy Clarkson endorsing the Down to the Countryside Movement on my 2024 bingo card.

 

Have I missed something?

Wasn't there mentioned an option of a choice between going into the services for 12 months or volunteering in the local community for every weekend during that same period?

I can thinking of a lot of local charities which would welcome the extra bodies.

 

How about making terms and conditions for working on farms attractive to kids as a career path?

 

If you'd watched Clarkson's farm, you certainly would have.

 

“… my football team just got promoted to the Premier League”

The only words of any sense that have been uttered by Sunak so far in this campaign

COYS