Cummings will ensure ‘normal jogging’ is not an option. Bojo needs to be transformational. To do that he must act early and with clarity; Cummings appears to have those abilities in spades.

+1. An Excellent analysis of a very good speech. Frost’s speech may lack a level of detail that some may feel unnerving, nevertheless, it captures very well the broad sweep of our sentiment and position without plastering unnecessary ‘red lines’ all over the shop. The references to Canada and Australia are subtle enough. The EU would do well to think deeply about its content, though I doubt they are really willing to do so. Classic British nuance at its best.

+1

‘May deserves better than this.....’ Comical Andy, CH, Nov 19. 🤣

Having served since the mid 90’s I would observe that HMAF is in a relatively good place. We accept that defence is usually a Cinderella priority with the voter and that rationalisation is a fact of life. Nevertheless, we are second only to the US in the quality of our kit and our fighting ability. Indeed, when training with the US, they recognise we are as good as it gets, in terms of interoperability. I would argue our key issue is in the ‘offer’ to our service personnel - particularly in terms of the standard of accommodation, the steady degradation of our allowances and the quality of on base food and amenities, particularly for the Army whose standard of accommodation is generally shocking.

As for CAPITA, they did not set the original contract, the Army did, which caused significant issues, due to a number of incredibly poor decisions. CAPITA have worked hard to ‘regain’ the situation - working closely with uniformed staff to learn lessons and work through issues caused by the original contract. Pipeline figures are now very encouraging, proving that lessons identified have been learnt. ‘This is belonging’ appears to be resonating well with our Main Target Audience - however, to ensure all this good work brings real VFM to the taxpayer, then the Gov must ensure robust action on the ‘offer’ To fix the retention issue. It really isn’t rocket science.

+1

Histronic narcissist. He''ll get on well across on the other Benches.

Indeed. ;-)

+1

Joe, whilst I struggle to fault your analysis re DC, I am afraid your assertion that it would be profoundly wrong to blame TM or PM is significantly wide of the mark. This 'crisis' has been very poorly managed.. either incompetence, or worse.