"The pint is served roughly. It spills as it lands on the bar, sending a little eddy of suds down the glass, into the lattice of branded rubber matting, a place where neither scrubbing brushes nor a desperate human tongue can penetrate. Typical. My 5p Reform windfall, gone in the clumsy flick of a wrist. I guard the pint carefully as I weave a perilous path to my table, quietly satisfied at pushing another struggling family closer to penury."
"Never mind that HMRC's own estimates blow a hole in his sums, assessing his buffet of inducements at about 10bn more than budgeted. Within these four wood-panelled walls, anything goes. The questions will be softball and the banter will be legendary. No mate, no no mate, hear me out. You know how Labour took 450,000 children out of poverty? What if we put them back in and spent the money on pints for the lads instead?"
A roughly served pint and a spilled 5p windfall set the scene in a pub where optics and conviviality dominate. Nigel Farage promised a £3bn hospitality tax relief framed as 5p off a pint, to be funded by reinstating the two‑child benefit cap. HMRC estimates place the true cost about £10bn higher than claimed. The event prioritized atmosphere and applause over fiscal accuracy. Labour offered policy rebuttals such as extended World Cup opening hours and a hospitality support fund. The pub is portrayed as a strategic stage where the hard right seeks working‑class credibility through image rather than detailed policy debate.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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