[The Weeping Angel]

UK unemployment shows surprise fall to 4.9% as pay growth drops to lowest in five years
Bank of England expected to keep interest rates on hold as Iran war casts shadow over labour market

Quite a large fall too (from 5.2%). Possibly a fluke or possibly business was adjusting to the higher costs better than lots of people expected.

Is that good or bad?

[Tubby Isaacs]

The fall is good. Or was until Trump attacked Iran.

The point I was making is that business has had quite a lot of costs to absorb, from the minimum wage, tax and won't like the new working rights coming in next year. It would be good if it had been managing to do that without much effect on employment.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Ed Davey's latest "there we have it" revelation is McSweeney saying that he didn't think Mandelson would have been appointed if Kamala Harris had won.

Had McSweeney said the opposite, then it would have been "determined to appoint Trump either way", or some such. Does Ed think that other countries didn't make hurried changes to their diplomatic approach when Trump II came in? What's the scandal here?

[Tubby Isaacs]

I generally rate Theresa May higher than the other recent Tory PMs, but someone BTL pointed out that, having suspended Charlie Elphicke, she then restored the whip to him because she needed him to vote for her deal. He was of course found guilty in court.

I don't remember a thousandth of the current furore over that. Mandleson of course has not even been accused of a sexual offence, just that he stayed (very) friendly with someone who'd committed one.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Labour’s Alex Barros-Curtis said he did not need to be told how to vote today. He said he was voting against the motion, because he did not believe the case for an inquiry had been made out.

As a solicitor, he had seen many witness statements, he said. He said the case made by Kemi Badenoch in her speech was “one of the most poorly made out cases in my professional lifetime”.

Ha ha. I can well believe it, even without hearing Kemi's effort at making a quasi-legal case.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Yeah, Starmer gets easy media coverage.

This "scandal" was all about process. That's why people are concentrating on it. If the argument were that Starmer had to resign for appointing Mandelson, that would have been made months ago, when it wasn't. And lots of media types said it was a good appointment, so calling for resignation over it would be a stretch even for them.

I have no idea what Starmer has done to Stephen Bush.

[mattomac]

He really hates Starmer doesn't he...

That's frankly as deluded as Reform saying the establishment are out to get them, maybe not as much as anything Liz Truss says mind.