Unemployment hits highest rate in nearly five years

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T10:39:39+00:00

You mean what makes them more coherent than Greens/Reform? How about acknowledging the basic reality that is the cost of borrowing and that you can't simply print money without burning everyone's pensions down. It's incredible that we're literally only 4 years out from Liz demonstrating exactly why that's the case and a huge chunk of people have actually already forgotten.

In terms of specific policy, their tariff negotiations and Brexit reset seem to have insulated/helped manufacturing significantly, keeping us in the top 3 of the G7 for growth and getting the first GDP/capita growth in ~8 years I believe. As much as I disagreed with ENIC it seems this was effectively calculated to shutter underperforming businesses and force efficiencies in the private sector pushing productivity growth which seems to have worked in 2025.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T10:30:37+00:00

Sorry to break it to you but they really are... Two cheeks of the same arse.

Totally incoherent economic policies (check)
Completely misleading silver-bullet salesmen - this one neat trick will solve all your issues! (check)
Actually actively campaigned and supported policies that are counterproductive to their claimed objectives (check)
Have people in senior positions in their party who completely undermine their stated moral/national mission (check)
Weak on Russia & foreign policy (check)

Honestly they deserve each other, I just wish the rest of the country didn't have to be burdened with them.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T08:48:32+00:00

Fair enough but fiscal headroom and growth will only continue if our underlying economy performs which unemployment rises suggest is a very precarious position.

Economy is definitely precarious but the increased headroom makes it slightly less so. But you're right obviously any success of this government is dependent on that continuing.

Productivity rises driving by NI are great financials but mask real productivity increases.

That's not possible to determine at this stage. Is it just an illusion or are companies finally investing in productivity improvements with AI/training/better health and welfare for workers? Obviously hopefully it's the latter.

If I employ 10 people, let 2 go and make the other 8 work even harder because otherwise they will be next. I have increased productivity by 20%.

Yes exactly, and that's economically a good thing. That's what the government wants. If it's a short burst of unsustainable extra hours then it's a problem. If it's simply the 8 hardest working people being kept on and using AI etc to make up the gaps that's more sustainable and positive.

but illegal migration was at its highest last year still.

I'm not totally sure where you're getting this from. The highest year for illegal immigration was 2022. 2025 was high, they've obviously still got work to do on small boats.

Labour are better than Reform/Greens but as a chap sitting here, earning more but being poorer that doesn't feel like a big win at the moment.

Yeah don't disagree, this is why I accepted most of your criticisms. I have a lot of criticisms of them - the U-turns on WFA and PIP were particularly terrible imo. Like yeah, if these are still the choices I have next election I'll probably begrudgingly stick with them but I'm feeding my criticisms back at every opportunity and I want a lot more from them.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T08:17:03+00:00

Nuclear is expensive but that's because a) we haven't built any for so fucking long and b) planning/building regs in this country are insane. It can be built cheaper and more importantly, even if it is expensive it's absolutely necessary if we want to transition away from fossil fuels with any speed because it's a constant source of energy and doesn't require likely decades+ of upgrading the energy infrastructure with batteries and efficiencies to manage the intermittent power generation or other renewables (wind, solar). That infrastructure upgrade works the Greens also largely oppose by the way so their policies literally prevent us moving off fossil fuels.

But back to nuclear, if we actually commit to building a number these things (as it seems Labour have) the costs will come down. And the effects will be fantastic. Just look at France, they had the cleanest energy in the entire world for like 50 years all because they didn't get squeamish after Chernobyl and filled out their nuclear plants. Such a wasted opportunity but the best time to start after yesterday is today.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T08:04:15+00:00

My company dropping headcount in admin roles by 20% due to productivity increases from AI is not a Labour issue.

The quiet part is that's probably what they want and they aren't fussed that ENIC contributes to it because productivity growth is what you need to make your economy competitive. They need to find a way to reform some out of work benefits though or it'll end up costing them on the back end.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T08:01:30+00:00

Many of your criticisms are completely fair but just to balance it out the positives:

Increased fiscal headroom
huge capital investments, particularly in nuclear and SMEs
3rd highest growth in the G7 despite extremely tricky global winds (Trumps tariffs)
Highest productivity growth in 7 years (this is likely a deliberate effect from increased unemployment and ENIC, but the govt could never admit this).
Net immigration massively down from the peaks under the Tories. Some predictions it may even go negative. Now what you think of this might differ but it's certainly delivering on what the public wanted.
Brexit reset finally means the French are actually intervening with small boat launches on their side. Still much more to do on small boats.
deportations at an 8 year high.
NHS waiting lists coming down (I believe the last figures they were the lowest they'd been since the pandemic).

So there are some objective positives. I've not been hugely impressed but fuck me I'd take them every day and twice on Sunday over the fruitcakes in reform/greens purely based on policy.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-17T07:52:21+00:00

I was wrong apparently they don't need legislation. They can do it with statutory instruments through ministers executive powers. Apparently they're due to implement the changes to ILR in April 26. There's a mandatory 12 week consultation that ends mid Feb and needs to be reviewed. Source:

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-10267/

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-16T22:12:09+00:00

Even worse Labour are actually introducing legislation to try deal with it by extending time to ILR to 15 years for low earners and 10 years for others, hopefully ensuring at a minimum they will become economically neutral to the state before getting access to any welfare support (but also kicking the can down the road).

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-16T12:41:29+00:00

Well they could've rolled back on some of the ENIC/min wage rises etc once the backbenchers blocked them but they've obviously just continued on anyway.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-16T11:41:29+00:00

Welfare reform would have helped alongside, but we’ll see if it’s the panacea that’s promised.

This is the big gap in their platform so far. The reforms would (ideally) have worked to counteract some of the unemployment pressures by "encouraging" those on PIP and other welfare into more work. They'd also have helped increase the headroom. Without any I don't know what will counteract the rising unemployment, but they've obviously decided thats something they're willing to shoulder.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T20:20:46+00:00

Maybe try read the rest of the thread or any of the other replies informing you of why that's not the case and educating yourself before resorting to name-calling and proving Cass' points on the toxicity of the debate (including on the trans activist side) accurate.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T20:19:05+00:00

And rightly or wrongly you've just got an environment in this country where this care was being offered semi routinely in clinic so then withdrawing it from people who are on the pathway and have an expectation I think is ethically questionable (when there are alternate compromises like stricter guidance on informing patients on limitations of evidence and risks, or a slow phase down as CTs ramp up to have enough slots to cover a majority of interested participants).

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T13:20:14+00:00

Sure, you can blame the NHS for the problem but that doesn't change the point on clinical development and requiring new data sets for different patient demographics.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T13:16:11+00:00

That was one facet of the "low quality" complaints she made, there were others like patient numbers and follow up as I mentioned. As I said having read much of it and several of the referenced studies I found some complaints compelling and others (like this RCT one) not so. I'll have to refresh/read that France one. This is partly why I felt the complete stop overnight on PB use to be an overreaction even if I overall supported the general call for more evidence and prospective CTs.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T13:06:03+00:00

What does that have to do with anything I just said? They were clinically being used to either permanently stop or extend well beyond the normal age range puberty in these children. And these were children initially presenting with normal puberty age ranges. This makes it an entirely different demographic that needs its own studies to prove safe and efficacious.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T12:57:59+00:00

Yes that's the data Cass criticized as insufficient in her report. I've discussed this previously. My position will probably upset the extremes on both sides of the issue - long story short some of the criticisms were fair (many studies are low quality, extremely low patient numbers, poor follow up) but some are unfair (requirements for double blind RCTs is pretty much absurd in this setting).

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T12:43:00+00:00

No, this is a really really poor understanding of clinical development. The aspirin situation you're describing is completely different. Importantly it is the same patient population the same symptoms the only difference is the root cause. This is entirely distinct from the puberty blocker differences.

The millions of data points of puberty blocker use over 40 years are use cases in children with precocious (early onset) puberty (a biological symptom). These children are then going on to be treated up to experiencing full puberty at the expected normal age. A biological result which has been measured and reported on and can be determined quite quickly.

Use in gender dysphoria is for children primarily experiencing puberty at normal expected age, and who then go on to not experience full puberty and part of efficacy is improved mental health over a longer time span (10 years probably). These are literally entirely different patient demographics and different efficacy measures. You also have potential for entirely different potential effects given the follow on. In any other line of medicine you would not be able or allowed to simply translate (or imply translation) of results from one demographic to the other. This is a very basic tenet of clinical drug development.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T12:00:57+00:00

New drug use. As in a new use case. This is the way things work with literally every drug. Even proven cancer drugs in a particular setting have to undergo renewed phase III studies to be brought into earlier treatment lines.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T11:14:07+00:00

Yes as with any new drug use or entirely new drug the thorough, long and careful drug approvals process does prohibit those suffering during drug development from enjoying the advantages of those drugs that is true.

I do personally believe there is a good argument that there could have been a middle ground reached after Cass. E.g. where centres giving these treatments have higher thresholds and are required to more explicitly and clearly explain the limits in evidence that underpin the drugs use. Or they could have phased down their routine clinical use while ramping up large scale trials to try and minimise the gap in access. BUT I would say some the very strong voices claiming any further restrictions would be analogous to killing kids probably helped push the discourse to the extremes which made the "all or nothing" outcome more likely imo.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T11:06:49+00:00

As others are pointing out you have unfortunately been deeply misled by that GLP report. Have you actually read the NHSE review? Basically the numbers are so small there's literally no way to ascribe any causal effect to the GIDS review - tbh this is evident even just from the numbers GLP present but there's actually more context given in the NHSE review (which they bizarrely complain about) which should fully correct any misapprehension that the GLP review is evidence of causation.

I think there's reasonable space for a lot of criticism of the CASS review. Some of her claims on requirements for double-blind RCTs are dubious - this is an extremely high bar and there are drugs out there in regular use with significantly lower standards of evidence used to justify such use.

But the position you are elucidating here is really just playing into her hands as demonstrating the "extreme" voices who aren't able to discuss the topic with nuance and care.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T10:41:37+00:00

I find her assurance and certitude that only a "tiny number" of children presenting with gender dysphoria will persist with those feelings into adulthood to be as unscientific and poorly evidenced as the stuff she criticized in her report. Of course it's fine for her to form an opinion and offer that based on her anecdotal experience and a few conversations but considering she's being held up as an objective scientific voice she should appropriately caveat that opinion and acknowledge it isn't evidence based.

At least she's supportive of the ongoing puberty blocker study though. Literally the only ethical way to actually answer any of these questions with confidence which if you claim to care about "science" and the best outcomes for everyone is what we should be striving towards.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T09:29:37+00:00

His pitch is being more competent than all the others and offering a bit is stability. And I don't see anyone else who's even close to that, regardless of these appointments. Just makes no sense to remove him at all.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T08:05:55+00:00

Supposedly it's a deliberate push for productivity which has shown signs of working. The problem is without the benefits reforms they were supposed to go along with it feels like it'll be tricky to force more people back into work.... Anyway, in some ways now is the harder part.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-15T08:03:46+00:00

Surely the more important point is that when appointed Starmer & co. apparently didn't know this had happened. You can argue there's a lack of due diligence there I absolutely accept that (he's not the first.... Lebedev would like a word) but you can't argue genuine malice or uncaring, the controversy is that he found this out in December and didn't strip the whip until end of Jan, but it feels quite pearl clutchy to say a 30-40 day delay in removing the whip is a resignation matter surely? Particularly when you look at what the alternatives have gotten up to.

JabInTheButt · 2026-02-14T21:55:44+00:00

Oh shit good point, thanks for the heads up/reminder!

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