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  "path": "/opinion/jacob-rees-mogg-labour-wallowing-indecision",
  "publishedAt": "2026-02-18T22:49:02.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.gbnews.com",
  "tags": [
    "Neil Oliver uncovers ALARMING Covid vaccine truths from Pfizer's own documents: 'See for yourself!'",
    "Not content with crashing economy, Rachel Reeves is hitting our war chest - Lt Col Stuart Crawford",
    "Reform's real enemy at the ballot box is not Labour - Adam Brooks",
    "The GB News Editorial Charter"
  ],
  "textContent": "\n\n\nIn the good old days, when we had leaders with backbone, this is what we used to hear.\n\nTo those waiting with bated breath for that favourite media catchphrase — the _U-turn_ — I have only one thing to say:\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n_You turn if you want to.\nThe lady’s not for turning._\n\nThis, unfortunately, is not the view of the current government, which seems to think its job is to prepare for the next headline by seeing quite how many U-turns it can execute in a London taxi in the shortest possible time.\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nTRENDING\n\nStories\n\nVideos\n\nYour Say\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nLet’s look at the current Chancellor of the Exchequer today — sticking boldly, of course, to her course.\n\nThe delay.\nPlans to increase the minimum wage for 18- to 20-year-olds, supposedly to allow employers a better chance to hire more people.\n\nWe already have incentives to hire young people: the apprenticeship rate of the minimum wage, and no National Insurance contributions for the youngest workers. But we _do_ recognise there are challenges.\n\nOr rather — _as well_.\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nBecause the number of U-turns is going up and up. You could probably sing them to _The Twelve Days of Christmas_ if you had a musical turn of mind. But let’s go through them.\n\nDigital ID cards.\nBusiness rates for pubs.\nInheritance tax on farmers.\nThe two-child benefit cap.\nIncome tax thresholds.\nWorkers’ day-one rights.\nWASPI women’s compensation — where they lied.\nWelfare and disability benefit cuts.\nGrooming gangs — a national inquiry, which they said was a “far-right” thing.\nWinter fuel payments.\nTrans rights definitions.\nNational Insurance.\nMeasurements of national debt.\nDelayed elections across 30 local authorities — which they now have the gall to blame on the local authorities themselves.\n\nAnd now, a refusal to rule out a minimum wage boost.\n\nU-turn.\n\n### LATEST DEVELOPMENTS\n\n\n\n\n  * Neil Oliver uncovers ALARMING Covid vaccine truths from Pfizer's own documents: 'See for yourself!'\n  * Not content with crashing economy, Rachel Reeves is hitting our war chest - Lt Col Stuart Crawford\n  * Reform's real enemy at the ballot box is not Labour - Adam Brooks\n\n\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nThis is absolutely extraordinary — not least when a leading member of the Cabinet, someone waiting in the wings to catch the ball should it come out of the scrum, said this. Mr Streeting, treating the NHS:\n\n“We have an initiative called G.R.A.F.T. — _Get It Right First Time_.”\n\nThat should be the government’s New Year’s resolution for 2026.\n\nLet’s try to get it right first time.\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nWouldn’t it be miraculous if they could? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could actually have a little bit of proper government?\n\nBecause that is the real problem. The current government didn’t know what it wanted to do when it came in, hasn’t worked out what it wants to do now, and therefore staggers day to day, crisis to crisis, to the detriment of the country — and then shies away from the blame.\n\nAnd this is constitutionally important.\n\nThere are two principles of Cabinet government on which our constitution rests — on which we are governed. One is _collective responsibility_. The other is ministerial responsibility.\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nCollective responsibility has already gone for Burton.\n\nJust today, we had the Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, criticising the Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, claiming it wasn’t up to him that the two-child cap had changed. They are squabbling with each other. There is no united Cabinet view.\n\nThat makes holding them to account more difficult, because they simply say: _“It wasn’t me — it was my colleague over there. Blame him.”_\n\nThat undermines democratic accountability.\n\n###\n\n\n\n\nSo does the loss of ministerial responsibility.\n\nAnd then there is the Prime Minister himself — Sir Keir Starmer. In case he hasn’t noticed — and sometimes I think he hasn’t — he must think he’s just the cat who’s wandered into Downing Street, confusing himself with whatever the cat is called.\n\nBecause whenever something goes wrong, it’s not his fault.\n\nBut the art of all good leadership is simple: the credit goes to subordinates; the blame rests with the boss. All good bosses know this.\n\nYet he blamed a speechwriter for saying the country was an “island of strangers”. He blames councils for cancelling local elections — which _must_ be his fault, the government’s fault, because councils have no power to cancel elections unless the government gives it to them.\n\nAgain and again, they make U-turns.\n\nAgain and again, they blame others.\n\nAnd no government is taking place.\n\nThis matters — because what the country needs is economic growth. To get that, we need clear policy. We need to know where we are going. We need a government that is responsive to, and accountable to, the electorate — not one that wallows in indecision, failure, and general hopelessness.\n\n###\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n**Our Standards:The GB News Editorial Charter **",
  "title": "Labour is wallowing in indecision, failure and general hopelessness, says Jacob Rees-Mogg"
}