Quote Originally Posted by the other bob wilson View Post
Thanks for answering honestly. I'm at a loss mind as to why you still appear to rate Johnson above others. As for politicians I admire, there certainly aren't any in Cabinet positions I can think of and I don't see any stand out figures in the Shadow Cabinet either, but I do have some time for Starmer because I feel that he at least has a degree of competence to him. Despite her current problems, I would definitely vote for Sturgeon's party if I lived in Scotland and I think Adam Price comes over pretty well - in fact, I'd say I'm closer to favouring full Welsh independence than I've ever been, but still feel that would be a bit of a wasted vote because it's never going to happen in my lifetime.

If I was ever going to vote Conservative, I think it probably would have been in the days of the Coalition Government, but I never came close to it then and I certainly wouldn't now - I mentioned competence before, but this is the most incompetent Government I've experienced and any one who votes for them is doing so purely because of the sort of party loyalty charge that non Labour voters always direct towards south Wales valley voters.
I don't think I said I rated Johnston above the others any where in my response.

I said I was still more likely to vote for the Tories if there was an election now, which is not the same thing. I suspect by the time I have to vote in a national election again there may well be a different leader. Either that or Boris will have to up his game as leader.

The Tories seem to finally be learning some of the lessons from the Pandemic. They are correctly being more cautious over lifting the lockdown ( there will always be disagreements as to whether they are going too quickly or too slowly) and thus far ( and keeping fingers crossed) the vaccine program is going well, better it seems than most other countries ( especially the EU!!!!)

There is of course a raft of things they will now need to get right. They have already talked about changing the NHS by unwinding some of Lansleys reforms but they need to bite the bullet on Social Care fairly soon (though neither will directly affect us here in Wales since they are devolved, although they may influence decisions here if they get it right.

Brexit has been "done"!! Well sort of but there are still; of course many loose ends, how well they have sorted them out should be apparent at the next election.


It is difficult to judge a political leaders competence until he has been tested in office. Opposition is a different matter. Sir Keir certainly is far more competent than Corbyn but that is not a very high bar in my view.


You mention Sturgeon. I would not have voted for her anyway because I would not vote for independence if I was there. I am not against independence per se but I think if either Scotland or Wales went for Independence now they would faced years of struggle, Indeed if either of the enquiries now ongoing find she has breached the ministerial code she should in my view resign.

Finally I disagree with some of your last sentence, particularly your point comparing anyone who currently votes conservative with the Labour voter who, in the expression used at the time, would have voted a donkey into certain South Wales valley seats as long as he or she wore a red rosette. Yes the Tory parties competence can be questioned over some of their pandemic response but I think most government in Europe and many round the word have struggled with the Pandemic and had similar problems (lack of PPE, insufficient testing wrong decisions on lock down etc) This doesn't make the mistakes OK, but dealing with this pandemic was horrendously difficult for most countries, and I think pretty all the governments I have known in my lifetime would have struggled. In addition to the various things they need to improve such as social care they also need to develop a robust Pandemic plan which takes account of all the lessons learnt. And of course there need to be a public enquiry.