Farage. Well he’s Top of the Pops right now! 😂

Chocolatelovinggran

Staffed by believers?! Believing in what - Jesus? Allah? The Easter Bunny? Who decides?
My vote is for anyone who could sing The Monkees song ( although that might narrow the age of candidates somewhat)

Most Reform voters probably could remember the Monkees song.

Churchview

"Any signs in a foreign language should be removed - on roads, in hospitals/GP surgeries, for transport networks, wherever. This is England, and we speak English. Don't like it? Leave."

If Rupert Lowe gets his way thousands of drivers all across England will find themselves at the end of unmarked cul-de-sacs.

Do you think he realises that HM Government isn't just about England but the whole United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

You've hit on the real giveaway

Lowe's sheer arrogance and political ignorance equating the UK with England on a paid Elon Musk post.

"Staffed by believers" is straight out of the Trump MAGA Project 2025 playbook where public servants would be hired and fired based on their political beliefs. Seriously? Reform want to remove the impartiality of the Civil Service. Think back to when Sunak was trying to push through the Rwanda scheme and the First Division Association were concerned that Civil Servants would be asked to take actions which were illegal.

Allira

Claremont

The photo in the OP is sickingly retouched to make him look like an innocent angel! My foot.

This one is much more to the point, the text too

www.facebook.com/groups/tacticalvoting/permalink/1569798060371383/

😁

Well, he's not going to walk round all day with the expression in your link, Claremont!

No-one has the same expression all the time, probably not even you; I know I don't. The media has a habit of catching well-known people at their worst then publishing the pictures.

I don't like him but let's stick to facts.

😂
Remember Miliband eating a banana and the other Miliband eating a bacon sarnie, or was it a pasty?
Am sure he really does look like an innocent angel most of the time🤔😇

This week in the HoC, Rupert Lowe presented a Ten Minute Bill - Quantitative Easing (Prohibition).

The Hansard is here:

hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2025-01-08/debates/8B7172B2-ADDA-4448-B830-D96FAF3FAD5E/QuantitativeEasing(Prohibition)

Note his praise of Musk. Well he would, wouldn’t he?

Anybody who watched this live will be aware of the farce at the end when the Speaker asked who would prepare and bring in the Bill. You can hear the Speaker say, Absolute shambles.

Richard Murphy explains here what would have happened has we not had QE in 2008 and 2020.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/01/13/reform-wants-to-destroy-government-and-the-economy-as-we-know-it/

I urge people to read the whole piece but here are just a few paragraphs:

First, the idea that quantitative easing should be banned is extraordinary. This would have meant the UK banking system would not have been saved in 2008. The system as a whole would have collapsed. All savers would have lost their money. Transaction systems would have failed. With it, the food supply chain would have failed. The consequences are almost unimaginable.

The same is true of 2020. I guess Reform think there should have been no lockdown. The NHS would have collapsed. Massive numbers of people would have died, including many more medical staff. And, given the disaster that would have hit the economy, we would have been in deep trouble anyway. But what does Reform care?

Then note that Reform would not indemnify the Bank of England. This means they would let it fail; in other words, they would let the pound fail. As economic policies go, few get more absurd than that.

Lowe was supported by Farage, Tice and the other Reform MPs in presenting this Bill. It obviously reflects their thinking. What we can safely say is that the policy Reform proposed would completely crash the UK economy. They can promote the policy that brought the British, and so many other economies, down in the 1930s if they wish. It is a free country, but people should know that this is their plan.

They should also know that Reform wants to destroy government as we know it by removing its ultimate power, which is to create money. In doing so, the government's ability to save us from disaster would disappear. My question is, why would they want to do that, and what is their aim?

MayBee70

Wyllow3

On "returning the boats" - here it is in Reform Policy document, clearly promoting the falsehood we can return the boats.

To the extent people on GN supporting Reform have been believing it.

What also chilled me however was point 4
New Dept. of Immigration staffed by believers

whats the plan? Like trump atm, sack all the workers in the Dept of immigration and reappoint by tested "believers".

There’s a really interesting programme on BBC2 called The Balkans. They just interviewed someone from Albania who had come to the UK on a boat but was sent back. The programme just pointed out that, if we want to stop people trying to get to the UK we need to help poor countries get richer. I also only recently learned that the reason why we left Afghanistan so suddenly ( thereby letting down all the Afghan people that had worked for us) was because it was militarily impossible for us to stay there once America had pulled out. Those poor people are still in danger and desperate to escape ( and Trump has just pulled the plug on them going to America). We have to get to the bottom of why people are needing to escape to the UK and it isn’t a quick fix.

I did see a bit of that programme, Maybee (have recorded it) and the man said he had paid or owed £23,000 (I believe that was the sum) to be smuggled here. When he arrived his job was to grow cannabis.

There are Afghan refugees living near here - no-one could begrudge them being here. The children attend a local school, they are not here under the radar.

I need to watch it properly. It’s a part of the world, and a war, that didn’t seem to get much coverage. I’m going by my rather awful memory here but I think I felt at the time that no one seemed too bothered because there was no oil there and that Blair and whichever president America had ( Clinton?) worked tirelessly towards ending the conflict. Which is one reason why Blair wanted to get involved with Iraq. Whatever mistakes he made over Iraq he never got the credit he should have done over Ireland and Yugoslavia.

SilverBrook

"Staffed by believers" is straight out of the Trump MAGA Project 2025 playbook where public servants would be hired and fired based on their political beliefs. Seriously? Reform want to remove the impartiality of the Civil Service. Think back to when Sunak was trying to push through the Rwanda scheme and the First Division Association were concerned that Civil Servants would be asked to take actions which were illegal.

I think my imagination is going a bit berserk here.

Did anybody see the "Ken" song at the Oscars? It had loads of "Ken clones" (from the Barbie film) doing a cheesy dance routine and a fab song.

Now, if they were to sing "I'm a believer", they'd be perfect for our new style civil service!

My daughter is a civil servant. I'm sure she'd be delighted to learn that she might have to swear some kind of allegiance to believing (in what?) at the start of every working day.

Well, I believe for every drop of rain that falls a flower grows and that somewhere in the darkest night a candle glows
I believe for everyone that goes astray someone will come to show the way

Forever the optimist, me.

Casdon

Which of you two sings the most like Davy Jones, that will clinch the deal.

I met him once. He came into a restaurant I worked in. I heard his lovely deep voice before I saw him . I am glad to report he was charming, polite and very unassuming.

I’d vote for Reform if only as a protest against Starmer. He is a dreadful politician, can’t stand him. I don’t particularly like Farage, either but he is the better of the two. At least he isn’t trying to drag the UK into the gutter.

Reform UK conference..
I’m all ears… 🤗

Chocolatelovinggran

Oh please, the road leading up from the Port of Dover is dangerous enough without holiday makers/ lorries/ coaches / caravanners checking their Google translate app to read the road signs.

and of course, on the other side in France, signs are posted in both English and French, reminding them to drive on right, etc.

nanna8

I’d vote for Reform if only as a protest against Starmer. He is a dreadful politician, can’t stand him. I don’t particularly like Farage, either but he is the better of the two. At least he isn’t trying to drag the UK into the gutter.

oh he is, big big time. Selling on the NHS to USA private insurance firms, and much worse.

Claremont

nanna8

I’d vote for Reform if only as a protest against Starmer. He is a dreadful politician, can’t stand him. I don’t particularly like Farage, either but he is the better of the two. At least he isn’t trying to drag the UK into the gutter.

oh he is, big big time. Selling on the NHS to USA private insurance firms, and much worse.

Oh to live in Australia...

MayBee70
Not everyone saw Blair as the saviour of Yugoslavia.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/jan/18/blairsearlierillegalwar

pascal30

Claremont

nanna8

I’d vote for Reform if only as a protest against Starmer. He is a dreadful politician, can’t stand him. I don’t particularly like Farage, either but he is the better of the two. At least he isn’t trying to drag the UK into the gutter.

oh he is, big big time. Selling on the NHS to USA private insurance firms, and much worse.

Oh to live in Australia...

Why?

No food on the shelves in N Queensland, roads broken up by floods, food trucks can't get through.
Not all are entitled to public healthcare. Pensions are means-tested.

I was talking about political views from the other side of the world about what is happening in the UK.. rather obliquely I grant you Allira

I take your point Pascal.

petra

MayBee70
Not everyone saw Blair as the saviour of Yugoslavia.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/jan/18/blairsearlierillegalwar

I did say I was going from memory and it was a long time ago. Thanks for the link.

Casdon

Boris Johnson was the three word slogan king I think.
Get Brexit Done!
Oven Ready Deal
Stay at Home
Hands, Face, Space
and hundreds more. He also wins the most frequently photographed bloopers by a politician competition - just Google, again there are hundreds. I think we became immune, whereas we remember the one offs by other politicians, because usually they are more sensible.

As for Farage, I can no longer ever look at him without thinking of Parker from Thunderbirds, his doppelgänger.

Yes 😂😂😂😂😂

Chocolatelovinggran

Ok Casdon and GrannyGravy, I'll go with that: sorted.
Who will let The Reform Party know that we've done the work for them?

I will. If I can find Farage, I will tell him 😢😂😂🙊🙉🙈🐵🐒

Shinamae

Reform UK conference..
I’m all ears… 🤗

Do you think the Conservatives will try and form an alliance with Reform? Subsume them? They’ll certainly have to do something in the next five years.

Claremont

k is not the only one here who thinks the same.

And yes, I do wonder what happened in their lives to make them so full of hatred and so lacking in any compassion. I just cannot imagine what hardships could cause this to be so severe. 'Rounded up' yes, just as in 1930s Germany and Austria. That word keeps coming back last few days 'chilling' in the extreme.

But careful what you wish for- we have desperate shortages in so many fields, and have lost so many staff since Brexit. One must be totally deluded to believe we can do without immigrant labour, and not only in well paid professions.

“Rounded up”

Mmmm, now what and who does that remind me of?

Oh yes, Mr H ( He who shall not be mentioned)

Claremont

Exactly the same will happen very quickly in the US, in fact it’s already started in States like California, who actually rely on migrant labour crossing the border each day to pick their fruit and vegs!

Also, those who appear to have so much hate in their hearts for our fellow men (& women) constantly need reminding those born in the UK are simply here as an accident of birth and that we have a long long history of accepting refugees.

I’ve not once heard ANY gransnetter state they support “unfettered and complete freedom of migration”

Most of us sane & sensible folk would favour a fair, controlled snd efficient migration system, with a fair policy on refugees, including safe passage.

Much as there are far too many crossing the channel, these people are not the cause of all our issues here, and even with no crossings and “rounding up” everyone who “doesn’t belong here”, we’d still have all the issues we have now!

We wouldn’t suddenly find ourselves in Ambrosia, Paradise or Xanadu!