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Labour’s fifty year and counting woman problem – politicalbetting.com
Labour’s fifty year and counting woman problem – politicalbetting.com
Today is the fiftieth anniversary of Margaret Thatcher becoming Tory leader and she has been a trailblazer for women the Tory party has gone to have three further women leaders yet Labour haven’t yet elected their first woman leader in those fifty years.
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I'm not one to stick up for the Labour Party, but this only matters if Labour has ever had a leadership election where a woman was the best candidate but was voted down because of her gender.
Anything else is just meaningless tokenism.
The real story today is how this country has trashed Margaret's golden economic legacy in 35 years of lazy centrist quasi-socialism. And then is somehow surprised when it ends up with despairing politics and no growth.
Why is Labour in a position where a woman has never been the best candidate? What has traditionally stopped women from reaching the top of the party? Why can the Conservatives repeatedly manage it, but Labour can not, especially given that Labour usually has more female MPs.
The problem might not be at the top, but lower down in the hierarchy.
Besides, Truss (and to a lesser extent May) were brilliant for equality: they showed a female leader could be just as bad as a male one.
3 failures and one with a mixed legacy that caused most of the structural economic problems of our rimes.
Same with Lab in this instance, as @JosiasJessop has pointed out, it's absurd to say "if only Lab had had a woman as the best candidate..."
Are we really saying that in the history of the Labour Party there has never been an instance of a woman being competent enough to take part in a leadership election and win. That's pretty damning.
Not the case for Brown.
I did not like her, but she won the election, even if she didn't get a majority, just like in almost every PR election winner ever on the planet.
The Tories have elected several women, sure, but most of them, bar Thatcher, were desperately poor picks.
See, for example, this nearly decade old article, which remains largely true.
https://tomforth.co.uk/imagination1/
The impoverishment of the regions was a direct result of Mrs T's policies.
1. Severe recession and unemployment: Thatcher's strict monetarist policies, including high interest rates and taxes, led to an unnecessarily deep recession in 1981. This caused unemployment to rise to 3 million, particularly affecting the manufacturing sector[6].
2. Increased inequality: Thatcherite policies resulted in a dramatic upswing in inequality between the richest and poorest 10%. By 1991, the gap between the richest and poorest had hit a record high, with incomes soaring for the wealthiest and falling for the poorest[1][4].
3. Deindustrialization: Thatcher's policies wiped out 15% of the UK's industrial base in just a few years, leading to the loss of stable jobs in mining, manufacturing, and steel. This disproportionately affected regions like Scotland, which lost 20% of its workforce in Thatcher's first two years[4].
4. Underinvestment in infrastructure and skills: Thatcherism left the UK failing to properly think about long-run investment, especially in infrastructure and workforce skills. Over the past 40 years, Britain's record of investment in infrastructure and R&D has been among the weakest of any major economy[1][5].
5. Financial deregulation: Excessive deregulation of financial services, starting with the Big Bang in 1986, contributed to the 2007 financial crisis[1].
6. Privatization issues: The privatization of utilities did not maintain investment in national infrastructure as expected[5].
7. Weakening of trade unions: Thatcher's policies significantly undermined trade unions, making it harder for workers to strike and limiting their ability to negotiate for better working conditions. This led to a decrease in workers covered by collective agreements from 82% in 1979 to 35% by 1996[4].
8. Housing crisis: The Right to Buy scheme, while providing a short-term financial boost, ultimately dried up the government's supply of social housing, contributing to long-term housing accessibility issues[4].
9. Regional disparities: Thatcher's policies led to the devastation of swathes of the old industrial economy, bringing wide regional disparities that persist to this day[5].
10. Boom and bust cycle: The economic boom of the late 1980s under Thatcher and her chancellor Nigel Lawson was unsustainable, leading to high inflation and the recession of 1991[6].
These policy mistakes had long-lasting effects on the UK economy and society, contributing to increased inequality, regional economic disparities, and underinvestment in crucial areas of the economy.
AI thinks she's to blame for everything. Must be a socialist.
40 years on we have BTL landlords rather than Social Housing.
If Thatcher's policies had side-effects that still cause problems, the blame goes as much to her successors who did little, or nothing, to address those side-effects, either by fettling or getting rid of the policies. She resigned 35 years ago.
You can do the same for her achievements.
It's a mixed legacy, neither golden nor disastrous. And successor governments are hardly free of responsibility for their own efforts.
She did get some things right.
But what I think people forget about Starmer is he is pretty ruthless and has worked to become PM specifically. I doubt he will give that up lightly.
Margaret Thatcher, the first female British Prime Minister, achieved numerous successes during her tenure from 1979 to 1990. Her accomplishments include:
1. Economic reforms: Thatcher implemented sweeping economic changes, including privatization of state-owned industries, reducing inflation, and promoting entrepreneurship[1][3]. These reforms helped shift Britain's economy towards a more market-oriented approach.
2. Political longevity: She served three consecutive terms as Prime Minister, a unique achievement in 20th-century British politics[1][2]. Thatcher held office for eleven and a half years, making her the longest-serving British Prime Minister of the 20th century[3].
3. Foreign policy: Thatcher played a significant role in ending the Cold War, working closely with US President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev[1][3]. She was instrumental in negotiating the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in 1987[3].
4. Falklands War: Her leadership during the Falklands War in 1982 was widely seen as a success, contributing to her re-election in 1983[1].
5. Housing policy: The "Right to Buy" scheme, which allowed council tenants to purchase their homes at discounted rates, was one of her most successful policies[3].
6. International standing: Thatcher became the first British politician since Churchill to achieve significant international standing[1].
7. Leadership style: She rehabilitated the idea of strong political leadership in Britain, discarding the notion that the country had become "ungovernable"[1].
8. Conservative Party success: Under her leadership, the Conservative Party won landslide re-elections in 1983 and 1987[3].
9. Counterterrorism: Thatcher's decisive handling of the 1980 Iranian Embassy siege in London demonstrated her resolve in facing political violence[3].
10. Legacy: Thatcher's policies and approach to governance, often referred to as "Thatcherism," continued to influence British politics for nearly two decades after her premiership[4].
To summarise the problem with Thatcherism, its profit today don't care about tomorrow. There was no plan of any kind beyond profits now. I credit that having smashed industry they at least had the decency to set up development corporations to redevelop the wastelands left behind - though that was also done for profit and many of these are now left without purpose. At least its more than successor governments did.
Point 4 on that list is massive. We stopped investing. In people, infrastructure, skills, technology. Why spend a decade investing for future gain when you can sell it now? This is at the heart of today's glaring crumbling decline of the UK - our infrastructure is crap, our civic framework is crap, our public services both cost a fortune and are crap, worker productivity is crap, industrial output is crap and the metric on all of these is to get worse not better.
We're spending money mopping up the expensive mess this creates and need to redirect that money onto primary functions (hire doctors) rather than the mess (hire agency locums and bought in care from the private sector). And we need to invest - heavily - in the long term.
Thatcher's most toxic legacy? We abandoned capitalism. Borrow. Invest. Gain a return on that investment. Reinvest. Government could do this today. Invest in fixing all these crap things which will deliver a return on that investment. But we can't politically, because its considered "subsidy" where "who pays" is the question, rather than "who profits"
I think the current 13.5 on her is good value on BFX.
On the last thread, I posted a Spectator TV video about politics and voice coaches. In the last five minutes or so, they discuss Angela Rayner, Wes Streeting and Nigel Farage.
Britain's best and worst political speeches – with Michael Gove & his speech coach Graham Davies
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6flBtjW4btc
Feel free to skip to the end because much of it is quite dull.
She firstly doubled down on the comment with a pathetic 'excuse'. Then she only apologised a month later, *after* a fellow MP was murdered.
It's a great example of a reluctant, forced apology. Not a genuine or heartfelt one.
Has she improved since then?
Like most of Thatcher's policies it was very good for the City of London which was highly competitive and proceeded to take a very large chunk of the financial services market for the whole of the EU but there was a price to pay and it was terrible.
The SM may not have helped, but the trend was already well set in.
The SM didn't trash the industrial base of Germany, France, Italy,...
She did not "lose" the election. Preposterous to suggest she did.
As with, for example, government confiscation of the right to buy proceeds, and the negatives of having privately owned monopoly utilities like the water companies - which were loudly protested for the same reasons they are judged today.
I don't absolve her successors from blame, far from it. But my criticism was directed at those who label her legacy "golden".
It really was not.
The British motorcycle industry is a classic example.
Housing issues are caused by the fact that housing construction has been a small fraction of what is needed. Due to the planning rules passed by Attlee and as subsequently amended, not due to Thatcher.
Rules which didn't matter too much when we had a stable population but are totally unfit for purpose for a growing one.
By focusing on the SM as a good thing, in Ricardian terms, rather than the policies needed to make it work for us, we did a lot of damage. And politicians today have still not learned these lessons. We assume that a SM results in additional growth for us. That would only be the case if we accept the discipline that it imposes but normally politicians demand free trade with no regard to the consequences.
I have said this many times. The SM is not a bad thing in itself, it should, all other things being equal, be a good thing. But it is only a good thing for us if we have the right set of policies. And we still don't.
Also worth saying that household growth has been even more rapid than population growth thanks to divorces and similar..
We have far more sept oct and and nonagenarians alive today living in a house either as a couple or as lone surviving partner, without any kids or grandkids etc living with them.
In 1968, post-Attlee and pre-Thatcher, there were 350,000 houses built in England, 150,000 of which were council houses.
By 1990, this had dropped to 150,000, almost none of which were council houses. Private developers seek to maximise profits, not the number of homes built, and the number has been consistently low for decades regardless of the planning environment or government policy.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-of-england-millennium
Hong Kong a bit more of a challenge.
Definitely Hanoi - it might be drizzly and grey this time of year but it’s a wonderful city. Food is superb (even some veggie stuff)
If she wants coast Halong Bay is beautiful but touristy and also likely to be a bit cool and grey right now. Maybe Nha Trang?
Hoi An is lovely
Then Dalat in the hills in the south and Saigon for sizzling tropical buzz
It’s a lot to do in a week tho
Try changing the timescale to see it.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-of-england-millennium?time=1945..latest
Indeed. Thatcher smashed the power of Trade Unions but did nothing about the inept and incompetent management. It was only with the implant of the Toyota plants in 1992 that we saw it did not have to be this way and even then we were incredibly slow to learn the lessons.
I wouldn't say Thatcher's legacy was 'golden'; it was mixed. But IMO many of the changes she made were sadly necessary.
It's nice to see some Union Flags the right way up.
The best time for housing construction and improvements consistently was the 1930s, pre Attlee's devastating reforms. And that was done privately.
There's a reason those like you who seek to entrench the system he bequeathed dodgily only use postwar data.
That was done for nakedly party political reasons.
Obviously the introduction of right to buy in the early 80s had nothing to do with population increase and housing issues from the early 80s.
Fertility rate cratered in the 70s and rose in the early 80s.
Either way though it's construction that is needed not worrying about who owns the housing. Construction that occurred privately in the 30s pre Attlee and at a time we were not rebuilding homes destroyed by wartime bombings.
It's just that the malaise was so deep, and the problems so complex, that it was not something that could be done overnight.
Which is extremely problematic as ceteris paribus you'd need far more construction post war to just stand still as we had to replace bombed buildings.
Attlee's reforms were an unmitigated disaster. Unless you are for some reason using wartime construction as your baseline, not prewar.
Very Woosteresque.
Almost far enough back in the past the reach the time when a lot of British Popular Newspapers and Highbrow Magazines were still dribbling all over Mussolini.
They run the same cruel and spectacle oriented refugee policy as the previous government, the same red lines towards the EU as the previous government, the same Trump arse kissing policy as the tories and reform, basically blue politics from a labour platform.
Seriously, labour are running the biggest advertising campaign for the conservatives and reform. But if you want those policies why vote for a knock off like Labour when you can get the real deal?
Labour need to understand that doing populist blue policies will not keep reform out - those voters will hate labour no matter what they do. It doesn't come down to a rational calculation of policy benefit among individual voters - it is purely an identity issue. Populist voters largely support a party in the same way a football fan supports their team - through thick and thin. It is about belonging, not results. You can't buy those voters with blue politics.
Labour needs to get its own voters onside instead [insert gag reflex]. Seriously man, there isn't even polling data to show that the broad electorate want those things... on a topic by topic break down they want the opposite.
Labour just seem to be bad a doing politics.... what a bloody shit show they are offering up. It seems like they are soooo scared of power and won't believe in anything.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/angela-eagle-minister-government-yvette-cooper-english-channel-b2695339.html
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/feb/02/uk-trade-eu-customs-union-yvette-cooper-keir-starmer
https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/uk-eu-donald-trump-tariffs-steel-imports-trade-war-united-states/
https://www.politicshome.com/news/article/blue-labour-v-reform-proworker-antiwoke-plan-beat-nigel-farage
We can't go back to heavy manufacturing, but we can do light manufacturing. We have multiple industries we can excel at - creative arts, finance, technological innovation and energy. Combine the two and we should be developing the next waves of tech to harness power from light, wind and waves, building the kit here and exporting.
Instead we're arguing about how green energy is a lie, and installing wind turbines built elsewhere. Our lack of strategic vision is shocking.
Far worse is the Kendall war on the disabled.
That's why all this prevarication around renewables, clinging onto a fossil fuel economy that is on the way out anyway, is so frustrating. Thatcher would have recognised that nearly limitless domestic energy generation could transform our economy in ways that none of us can anticipate.
The key is providing some sort of economic (rather than welfare-based) safety net that softens the blow for those industries that are killed off. That might be infrastructure spending based on the inverse of regional real wages, or nodal energy pricing, or lower tax rates in those parts of the country. There should now be massive incentives to invest and move to Aberdeen, Hull, Teesside etc etc.
All doomed by incoming tech, I fear
Bid to take over OpenAI:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cpdx75zgg88o
https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/7617/economics/economic-growth-during-great-moderation/
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn05206/
New Labour were just as bad as Thatcher for manufacturing. If not worse. Fig 4 on the below.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/economicoutputandproductivity/output/articles/changesintheeconomysincethe1970s/2019-09-02
(Following up a coincidental short note I posted last night about a pensioner T couple in there 70s who want to think about fitting a walk-in shower, but need to think about the pros and cons vs a big storage cupboard in their hall when I renovated I fitted with a desk, hanging, shelves and space for a tumble dryer.)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2jvpjr7dro
(For my money, for rented properties this should probably have a portion of LL copay for larger grants over say £10k, if it could be made to stick.)
There's a general belief in this country that costly, long drawn out and difficult to obtain decisions are the best decisions, whether it applies to planning, visas, and now assisted dying. But actually they are just barriers.
The contrast between the North East and London in say 1986 was very stark.
There was a book written by someone in the industry - forgotten the author & title - which describes the bizarre feeling of management and workforce working together. All he’d known was conflict.
And many of the faces were the same on both sides. Yet with a different company culture…