"We pride ourselves on not shying away from sensitive issues that other local politicians prefer not to discuss."
"Promotion of a unifying shared British identity."
Sufficient provision for the essential needs of the populace, otherwise preserving individual liberty."
No Labour votes here. Plenty for the "Eng Nat" Cons.
Seems a bit "motherhood and Apple Pie" as the Americans would say.
Are you against the British identity?
Are you against individual liberty?
Are you against discussing sensitive issues?
All meaningless phrases. Where's the beef?
I have little interest in them other than from the by-election betting angle. They have the air of hardcore Ukip to me (the guy who formed them certainly is) and I think they'll be breaking heavily Con. If you wish to make another bad call by thinking something else, by all means go for it.
I'm not making a call this time. I know nothing about them and if BXP were prepared to go Tory and not be neverTories then there seems to be little reason these won't do the same.
UKIP is dead so hardcore UKIP is meaningless, just as those words in bold you highlighted are meaningless. You've not said what they mean to you that Labour should be against instead of being meaningless guff.
It's dead as a party but not as an attitude. In this sense it's still a lot of people and where their votes are going these days is a significant factor shaping our politics.
Its dead as an attitude, we've left the EU. That was the unifying feature, beyond that they were just cranks.
What's left of the attitude?
The attitude.
The UKIP/Brexit Party attitude is far more insidious than the actual act of exiting the EU. Exiting the EU was just a symptom of the belief set held by many of the people that vote that way. It is a belief set also held by Scottish nationalists; a belief set that is about hatred of other people, division and at the more extreme end a menace with a threat of violence. It is a political genie that is well out of the bottle. It will take generations to get it back in.
Agree re Brit Nat. Scot Nat, though, I don't equate to that (although I know you do). For me, being genuinely about sovereign self-determination, it's not a malign movement. You can see this from the Scots posters on here. They're not McFarages or McRobinsons.
I think you're allowing the fact that you quite like the superficial pro-unionism/leftism of Scottish Nationalism to blind you to some of its nastier edges (like the hounding of Charles Kennedy, for one, and the anti-English hardcore), and the fact that you don't like UKIPpery to accentuate its nastier fringe to be more than it is. I'm certainly not tarring any of our Scot Nat posters here with that brush; that element is a fringe, not a core. But equally Tommy Robinson does not typify either the average leave voter or the average UKIP voter. I don't think the 'threat of violence' - which I think is a good measure of the nastiness of a movement - is any more in evidence in the supporters of UKIP and its successors or of Leave in general than in the supporters of the SNP - or indeed in the supporters of the hard left in its various guises.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
So, when the 17% for the greens goes down to 5%, where does it split? Strong chance of a LD pickup here on the basis that Lab are crap.
If the LDs gain Chesham and Amersham from the Tories and the Tories gain Batley and Spen from Labour it would be further evidence of the post Brexit realignment of our politics as shown too in the local elections, with Labour getting squeezed outside the big cities and Wales
The tories losing C&A would be surely be a serious problem for Boris, especially if tory turnout was low.
It would also put Tory MPs in Remain or soft Leave seats across the Home Counties at risk from the LDs, though Boris could counteract that with further gains from Labour in Midlands and Northern strong Leave seats like Batley and Spen and Hartlepool
I think it would be a big mistake to assume the tory vote in the south is waning because the conservatives there are disappointed remainers.
I rather think it is partly because the voters there are conservatives.
It is mainly due to Brexit and at a local level rising Nimbyism in the South East, even in 2019 at the general elections there was a swing from the Tories to the LDs in most Home Counties Remain seats relative to 2017 once Boris had taken over even before the lockdown and the big spending despite the swing from Labour to the Tories in the Midlands and North. In the May 2019 locals the LDs also made big gains from the Tories in places like Guildford
It may also be because some of us find populism distasteful and un-Conservative. Some of us also find having someone who is a proven habitual liar without principles also un-Conservative. The Conservative Party has shifted it's base of support from those who thought Conservative values were the best for Britain to it's lowest common denominator of support who are essentially English Nationalists with fundamentally unpleasant views.
Trouble is that I can think of quite a few people like that on this site (what would you call a UK version of the Lincoln Project, anyway?), but it's still a fairly small niche in the wider population.
For now.
For now indeed.
Well either you have populism or you have elitism. Either people make up their own minds what they want, or defer to their betters to do it for them. Both have their pros and cons.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
Says the guy who said Angela Rayner was too stupid to be PM
Opposition Leader Satisfied Dissatisfied Net satisfaction Date of poll % % % Thatcher 38 51 -13 Nov 1978 Foot 13 69 -56 Aug 1982 Kinnock 27 61 -34 Dec 1988 Smith 33 41 -8 May 1993 Blair 42 35 +7 Sep 1996 Hague 19 56 -37 Jan 2000 Duncan Smith 16 53 -37 Feb 2003 Howard 23 49 -26 Jun 2005 Cameron 23 45 -22 Sep 2007 Miliband 25 63 -38 Dec 2014 Corbyn 17 72 -55 Feb 2019 Either it's a blip, or Starmer's toast.
The only saving grace for Starmer is that the last 14 months the polls have been largely driven by the pandemic.
If this is the norm for the post pandemic phase then he's like a stepmom on Pornhub.
The only question is does the PLP have the desire to remove him?
I keep coming back to the question, that nobody's really answered - who would you replace him with?
Major Dan Jarvis.
Well quite. Personable, sane, doesn't keep banging on about Palestine. But does he want the job? All the signs I've seen are that he doesn't.
I've never heard Dan Jarvis speak, or what he really is like. All I know is that he was in the armed forces and that is why many think he could be good for Labour. The image of an ex squaddie might play well with the public. Other than that I don't know.
He's not strictly speaking a squaddie. He was an officer. BUT, and it's quite a big but, no one really thinks like that when you're talking about a Para or a Marine. He was the former. Pretty hard core.
I've a Labour friend from Barnsley who has been banging on about Jarvis for what feels like years and years.
How's Jarvis going to get past the membership vote though? Surely he will be viewed with suspicion by the bien pensants of N London and Middling University Labour club?
I just looked ta his Wiki page. he looks far too electable to be elected to Labour Leader. Absolutely no chance.
The next leader absolutely must be a woman apparently.
Or at least self-identify as...
That's one way of improving his ratings!
I now can't get David Walliams' "I'm a lady..." out of frame......
So, when the 17% for the greens goes down to 5%, where does it split? Strong chance of a LD pickup here on the basis that Lab are crap.
If the LDs gain Chesham and Amersham from the Tories and the Tories gain Batley and Spen from Labour it would be further evidence of the post Brexit realignment of our politics as shown too in the local elections, with Labour getting squeezed outside the big cities and Wales
The tories losing C&A would be surely be a serious problem for Boris, especially if tory turnout was low.
It would also put Tory MPs in Remain or soft Leave seats across the Home Counties at risk from the LDs, though Boris could counteract that with further gains from Labour in Midlands and Northern strong Leave seats like Batley and Spen and Hartlepool
I think it would be a big mistake to assume the tory vote in the south is waning because the conservatives there are disappointed remainers.
I rather think it is partly because the voters there are conservatives.
It is mainly due to Brexit and at a local level rising Nimbyism in the South East, even in 2019 at the general elections there was a swing from the Tories to the LDs in most Home Counties Remain seats relative to 2017 once Boris had taken over even before the lockdown and the big spending despite the swing from Labour to the Tories in the Midlands and North. In the May 2019 locals the LDs also made big gains from the Tories in places like Guildford
It may also be because some of us find populism distasteful and un-Conservative. Some of us also find having someone who is a proven habitual liar without principles also un-Conservative. The Conservative Party has shifted it's base of support from those who thought Conservative values were the best for Britain to it's lowest common denominator of support who are essentially English Nationalists with fundamentally unpleasant views.
Trouble is that I can think of quite a few people like that on this site (what would you call a UK version of the Lincoln Project, anyway?), but it's still a fairly small niche in the wider population.
For now.
For now indeed.
Well either you have populism or you have elitism. Either people make up their own minds what they want, or defer to their betters to do it for them. Both have their pros and cons.
Does anyone else think the enthusiasm for Burnham is overdone and that he would not have an appeal outside traditional Labour ground, and especially would not come over well in the south? There is no perfect candidate, but others to be preferred, I suggest.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made and despite the fact he is a life peer.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
"We pride ourselves on not shying away from sensitive issues that other local politicians prefer not to discuss."
"Promotion of a unifying shared British identity."
Sufficient provision for the essential needs of the populace, otherwise preserving individual liberty."
No Labour votes here. Plenty for the "Eng Nat" Cons.
Seems a bit "motherhood and Apple Pie" as the Americans would say.
Are you against the British identity?
Are you against individual liberty?
Are you against discussing sensitive issues?
All meaningless phrases. Where's the beef?
I have little interest in them other than from the by-election betting angle. They have the air of hardcore Ukip to me (the guy who formed them certainly is) and I think they'll be breaking heavily Con. If you wish to make another bad call by thinking something else, by all means go for it.
I'm not making a call this time. I know nothing about them and if BXP were prepared to go Tory and not be neverTories then there seems to be little reason these won't do the same.
UKIP is dead so hardcore UKIP is meaningless, just as those words in bold you highlighted are meaningless. You've not said what they mean to you that Labour should be against instead of being meaningless guff.
It's dead as a party but not as an attitude. In this sense it's still a lot of people and where their votes are going these days is a significant factor shaping our politics.
Its dead as an attitude, we've left the EU. That was the unifying feature, beyond that they were just cranks.
What's left of the attitude?
The attitude.
The UKIP/Brexit Party attitude is far more insidious than the actual act of exiting the EU. Exiting the EU was just a symptom of the belief set held by many of the people that vote that way. It is a belief set also held by Scottish nationalists; a belief set that is about hatred of other people, division and at the more extreme end a menace with a threat of violence. It is a political genie that is well out of the bottle. It will take generations to get it back in.
Agree re Brit Nat. Scot Nat, though, I don't equate to that (although I know you do). For me, being genuinely about sovereign self-determination, it's not a malign movement. You can see this from the Scots posters on here. They're not McFarages or McRobinsons.
What? Come on? Malcolmg? He is one of the most hate filled posters on here. Alex Salmond not malign? Hmm. No offence, but I think those of a centre left persuasion are in denial on this.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Does anyone else think the enthusiasm for Burnham is overdone and that he would not have an appeal outside traditional Labour ground, and especially would not come over well in the south? There is no perfect candidate, but others to be preferred, I suggest.
Just to repeat the stat from earlier - Burnham won every single ward in Greater Manchester, from Harpurhey to Hale. That's a pretty broad appeal he's managed to create.
His delivery should be compulsory listening for Starmer and Labour to understand just why he has his highest ratings and not Starmer's -48
His pants, you mean?
Have to say if its Boris vs SKS in GE2024 and the former is still pursuing the levelling up agenda
Put me down as a maybe
That WOULD be him "reaching the parts that other Tories can't reach" !!!
But I predict with enormous confidence that the Labour GE offering will be more in the material interests of the people you are concerned about than the Tory one.
Boris directing a kidney punch to Labour's Brechtian tendency:
He quotes the defeated Amber Valley Labour council leader who responded to defeat by saying: “The voters have let us down. I hope they don’t live to regret it.” Johnson says that is Labour’s approach; they want to change, not themselves, but the electorate.
Sounds like another "no money left" scenario, ripe for ruthless distortion. Sigh.
It is a belief set also held by Scottish nationalists; a belief set that is about hatred of other people, division and at the more extreme end a menace with a threat of violence.
Scot Nat, though, I don't equate to that (although I know you do). For me, being genuinely about sovereign self-determination, it's not a malign movement. You can see this from the Scots posters on here.
Oh, absolutely - comments by Scots posters on these very boards make it perfectly clear there's nothing malign about Scottish Nationalism.
300 years of cheating bastards stealing from us.
you are talking to someone as thick as two short planks, he will not understand.
Liar
lying Westminster arses pretend there is a deficit when in fact it is just to hide fact they have borrowed cash and pretend it has been spent on Scotland. Mugs like you are taken in easily.
bollox , you lying dumb horse's arse PS: At least we are not Richard pullers.
Maybe not interesting for arseholes down south , but people in Scotland will be interested. Pompous twat.
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
If you were wondering about that "working class confusion" at the heart of the party.....
"Willi, there's something I haven't told you. I also have an uncle in the hotel business. I admit he's a Baron, and the hotel has 500 bedrooms, but you do see the position it places me in."
"We pride ourselves on not shying away from sensitive issues that other local politicians prefer not to discuss."
"Promotion of a unifying shared British identity."
Sufficient provision for the essential needs of the populace, otherwise preserving individual liberty."
No Labour votes here. Plenty for the "Eng Nat" Cons.
What about the above is "Eng Nat"? The only nationality mentioned is British.
Yes, it could be written by Gordon "British jobs for British workers" Brown.
Not really.
"British jobs for British workers" is infinitely more xenophobic than anything written there.
"British jobs for British workers" versus "Promoting a Unifying British Identity".
Depends on intent and context. You can imagine both being said by the Far Right. And it's hard to imagine anyone but the Far Right pushing the 2nd one.
Are you are into the promotion of a "unifying national identity" btw?
What on earth is far right about wanting to unify rather than divide people? 🤔
I could imagine anyone pushing the second. A unifying national identity should include the best bits of your country - that is Tony Blair did with his flag waving "Cool Britannia".
What's the best of Britain that unifies us to you? Yes that's what politicians tend to put forwards in any mainstream party in any country around the globe. If you consider that "off" rather than "meaningless guff everyone should find agreeable" then I think your political antenna is a bit broken.
I was merely wondering if "promoting a unifying national identity" warmed your cockles. Seems it does. Doesn't do much for me, I must confess. But my cockles and yours are dissimilar, we know that. So no surprise there.
As to whether it's "off", this depends on what's meant by "identity".
And one has to get specific about it in order to tell. So, eg, if you wish a political party to promote a "Unifying English Identity" - which you do - what exactly does this mean to you?
Happy to defer any judgement until you flesh it out for me.
What does it mean to be united to be English? What does that mean to me?
A lot along the lines of stuff @Cyclefree has a tendency to put in her thread headers.
Equality before the law.
A free and fair judicial system.
A free and fair Parliamentary democracy.
That all people, regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, religion or anything else are free and equal.
Welcoming anyone who comes to make this country their home.
Generosity of spirit both at home and abroad. Giving aid to those who need it.
That anyone who gets sick in this country will be looked after.
Respecting the rights of others.
Treating each other with respect.
Settling our differences politely and democratically.
Accepting that we may not always win or get our way, with grace and generosity of spirit.
On a more fun level.
Complaining about the weather, then losing our minds and enjoying ourselves when its sunny.
Cheering on the Three Lions, only to see them eliminated by penalties.
The England Cricket Team and taking on the Aussies in The Ashes.
Wanting to beat the other Home Nations but coming together with them with Team GB.
And most importantly for all
A healthy respect that what it means to be united to be English might be different between different people.
That others may disagree with any or all of my list or have other priorities and be just as English.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
Says the guy who said Angela Rayner was too stupid to be PM
Just before the pandemic, I spent an enjoyable half hour with a pint in a pub in Central Manchester eavesdropping on some Labour Party members debating the leadership. Their view on Angela Rayner's intelligence was also less than complimentary, though they like her well enough as a candidate for deputy leader, on he grounds that John Prescott did ok. (They thought Long-Bailey too divisive and Nandy lovely but not a leader; their consensus was Starmer. This would have been insightful betting info if I'd related it sixteen months ago.)
So, when the 17% for the greens goes down to 5%, where does it split? Strong chance of a LD pickup here on the basis that Lab are crap.
If the LDs gain Chesham and Amersham from the Tories and the Tories gain Batley and Spen from Labour it would be further evidence of the post Brexit realignment of our politics as shown too in the local elections, with Labour getting squeezed outside the big cities and Wales
The tories losing C&A would be surely be a serious problem for Boris, especially if tory turnout was low.
It would also put Tory MPs in Remain or soft Leave seats across the Home Counties at risk from the LDs, though Boris could counteract that with further gains from Labour in Midlands and Northern strong Leave seats like Batley and Spen and Hartlepool
I think it would be a big mistake to assume the tory vote in the south is waning because the conservatives there are disappointed remainers.
I rather think it is partly because the voters there are conservatives.
It is mainly due to Brexit and at a local level rising Nimbyism in the South East, even in 2019 at the general elections there was a swing from the Tories to the LDs in most Home Counties Remain seats relative to 2017 once Boris had taken over even before the lockdown and the big spending despite the swing from Labour to the Tories in the Midlands and North. In the May 2019 locals the LDs also made big gains from the Tories in places like Guildford
It may also be because some of us find populism distasteful and un-Conservative. Some of us also find having someone who is a proven habitual liar without principles also un-Conservative. The Conservative Party has shifted it's base of support from those who thought Conservative values were the best for Britain to it's lowest common denominator of support who are essentially English Nationalists with fundamentally unpleasant views.
Trouble is that I can think of quite a few people like that on this site (what would you call a UK version of the Lincoln Project, anyway?), but it's still a fairly small niche in the wider population.
For now.
For now indeed.
Well either you have populism or you have elitism. Either people make up their own minds what they want, or defer to their betters to do it for them. Both have their pros and cons.
It isn't and never has been, a binary choice.
True, there will always be a continuum. But too much of the criticism of populism has airs of elitist snobbery about it.
Opposition Leader Satisfied Dissatisfied Net satisfaction Date of poll % % % Thatcher 38 51 -13 Nov 1978 Foot 13 69 -56 Aug 1982 Kinnock 27 61 -34 Dec 1988 Smith 33 41 -8 May 1993 Blair 42 35 +7 Sep 1996 Hague 19 56 -37 Jan 2000 Duncan Smith 16 53 -37 Feb 2003 Howard 23 49 -26 Jun 2005 Cameron 23 45 -22 Sep 2007 Miliband 25 63 -38 Dec 2014 Corbyn 17 72 -55 Feb 2019 Either it's a blip, or Starmer's toast.
The only saving grace for Starmer is that the last 14 months the polls have been largely driven by the pandemic.
If this is the norm for the post pandemic phase then he's like a stepmom on Pornhub.
The only question is does the PLP have the desire to remove him?
I think he'll be out if things haven't improved in around a year from now.
I fail to see how he would survive the loss of Batley & Spen.
I'd be surprised if he isn't given at least a year of post pandemic politics.
Boris directing a kidney punch to Labour's Brechtian tendency:
He quotes the defeated Amber Valley Labour council leader who responded to defeat by saying: “The voters have let us down. I hope they don’t live to regret it.” Johnson says that is Labour’s approach; they want to change, not themselves, but the electorate.
Seems reasonable to me. The Labour Party remains a bunch of ar*****es which has been its role in British politics for more than a hundred years. They shouldn't change now when they are about to be replaced. The Liberal Party got down to six MPs. Which would be the last six remaining weakholds? Labour will no doubt 'trot' someone out to say ah, but they said that in 1983. The difference is that in 1983 it was just the London elite that were saying it, now it is the party's key supporters. It started with a Keir and it will end with one.
Does anyone else think the enthusiasm for Burnham is overdone and that he would not have an appeal outside traditional Labour ground, and especially would not come over well in the south? There is no perfect candidate, but others to be preferred, I suggest.
Just to repeat the stat from earlier - Burnham won every single ward in Greater Manchester, from Harpurhey to Hale. That's a pretty broad appeal he's managed to create.
I wasn't so keen on him a decade ago when he was at Westminster but think he comes across really well now. Not sure if he has matured, the mayoral role suits him, or if the alternatives are now much worse calibre than they were back then - probably a mix of all three. He would be fine for floating voters in the south.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
Says the guy who said Angela Rayner was too stupid to be PM
Just before the pandemic, I spent an enjoyable half hour with a pint in a pub in Central Manchester eavesdropping on some Labour Party members debating the leadership. Their view on Angela Rayner's intelligence was also less than complimentary, though they like her well enough as a candidate for deputy leader, on he grounds that John Prescott did ok. (They thought Long-Bailey too divisive and Nandy lovely but not a leader; their consensus was Starmer. This would have been insightful betting info if I'd related it sixteen months ago.)
So @HYUFD demonstrates the very same "middle class sneering" as some Labour Party snobs. Good to know.
It is a belief set also held by Scottish nationalists; a belief set that is about hatred of other people, division and at the more extreme end a menace with a threat of violence.
Scot Nat, though, I don't equate to that (although I know you do). For me, being genuinely about sovereign self-determination, it's not a malign movement. You can see this from the Scots posters on here.
Oh, absolutely - comments by Scots posters on these very boards make it perfectly clear there's nothing malign about Scottish Nationalism.
300 years of cheating bastards stealing from us.
you are talking to someone as thick as two short planks, he will not understand.
Liar
lying Westminster arses pretend there is a deficit when in fact it is just to hide fact they have borrowed cash and pretend it has been spent on Scotland. Mugs like you are taken in easily.
bollox , you lying dumb horse's arse PS: At least we are not Richard pullers.
Maybe not interesting for arseholes down south , but people in Scotland will be interested. Pompous twat.
To be fair, is that Scots Nat posters? or is it one particular Scot Nat poster whose colourful turn of phrase we all enjoy , and who isn't even that keen on the SNP any more?
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
He comes from a pretty ordinary background. Corbyn's was more comfortable.
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
I can see why you would say that - but in reality I think you need someone more able to connect with your lost voters - no idea who that might be because your active membership membership appears to be bat shit crazy at times
Opposition Leader Satisfied Dissatisfied Net satisfaction Date of poll % % % Thatcher 38 51 -13 Nov 1978 Foot 13 69 -56 Aug 1982 Kinnock 27 61 -34 Dec 1988 Smith 33 41 -8 May 1993 Blair 42 35 +7 Sep 1996 Hague 19 56 -37 Jan 2000 Duncan Smith 16 53 -37 Feb 2003 Howard 23 49 -26 Jun 2005 Cameron 23 45 -22 Sep 2007 Miliband 25 63 -38 Dec 2014 Corbyn 17 72 -55 Feb 2019 Either it's a blip, or Starmer's toast.
The only saving grace for Starmer is that the last 14 months the polls have been largely driven by the pandemic.
If this is the norm for the post pandemic phase then he's like a stepmom on Pornhub.
The only question is does the PLP have the desire to remove him?
I think he'll be out if things haven't improved in around a year from now.
I fail to see how he would survive the loss of Batley & Spen.
I'd be surprised if he isn't given at least a year of post pandemic politics.
Two by election defeats - the first of which was self-inflicted in that there was no need for the by election - would destroy his authority and he would have reached the point of no return.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
Says the guy who said Angela Rayner was too stupid to be PM
I did not notice it much before but Rayner has plenty of charisma.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Labour is no longer the party of the working class, first it lost many of them to UKIP and the SNP and now it has lost lots of them to the Boris Tories, indeed under Starmer Labour members and voters are more middle class than the average Tory voter
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
Yeah he will definitely do the trick in the red wall.......shakes head.
Objectively, he is probably capable of doing the job- though I suspect his time (if ever there was one) has passed. And whilst Leeds isn't proper red wall, it's northern.
But, yes, if the objection to Starmer is his lawyerly shenanigans to hurt precious Brexit, then Benn would be even worse. And, although it's unfair, the sins of the father would be repaid on the son.
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
He comes from a pretty ordinary background. Corbyn's was more comfortable.
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Excuse me while I don't.
It is the way of politics and I fear it is going to continue and worsen
The media and narrative will see to that
I am not convinced he will be LOTO by the end of this year
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
There is a slight problem. Boris never hides he is a massive posho, everybody knows it. When you get into a bit of trouble is when you claim I am a common man, up the werkers, then somebody pops round and finds you have two kitchens, hired help that washes and cleans for etc.
Cameron also got in some trouble when he tried to over egg the being a normal bloke, down Morrisons on a Saturday morning, before feet up to watch the West Aston Ham United on the box.
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
Yeah he will definitely do the trick in the red wall.......shakes head.
Objectively, he is probably capable of doing the job- though I suspect his time (if ever there was one) has passed. And whilst Leeds isn't proper red wall, it's northern.
But, yes, if the objection to Starmer is his lawyerly shenanigans to hurt precious Brexit, then Benn would be even worse. And, although it's unfair, the sins of the father would be repaid on the son.
Though the father would have supported Brexit , had he still been with us.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
Says the guy who said Angela Rayner was too stupid to be PM
Just before the pandemic, I spent an enjoyable half hour with a pint in a pub in Central Manchester eavesdropping on some Labour Party members debating the leadership. Their view on Angela Rayner's intelligence was also less than complimentary, though they like her well enough as a candidate for deputy leader, on he grounds that John Prescott did ok. (They thought Long-Bailey too divisive and Nandy lovely but not a leader; their consensus was Starmer. This would have been insightful betting info if I'd related it sixteen months ago.)
So @HYUFD demonstrates the very same "middle class sneering" as some Labour Party snobs. Good to know.
To be fair to my eavesdropees - I don't think there was a class thing about it. I just think they thought she was thick. They did think she had other qualities. As do I, as it happens. Might be a bit exposed as leader if she's really not all that bright though.
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
Yeah he will definitely do the trick in the red wall.......shakes head.
Objectively, he is probably capable of doing the job- though I suspect his time (if ever there was one) has passed. And whilst Leeds isn't proper red wall, it's northern.
But, yes, if the objection to Starmer is his lawyerly shenanigans to hurt precious Brexit, then Benn would be even worse. And, although it's unfair, the sins of the father would be repaid on the son.
Yet again, I'd like to thank the PB Tories for their regular advice on who should be the next Labour leader. Today there have been recommendations for Andy Burnham, Ed Balls and Dan Jarvis - interesting, it ebbs and flows a bit but they all have something in common. You Tories should have taken our advice and gone for Jeremy Hunt - we kept telling you Boris was a bad 'un.
I hate to tell you this but PB Tories do in fact give good and sincere advice to Labour supporters when it comes to picking leaders. If Labour listened to PB Tories they would probably be in government now, but instead Labour keeps picking people PB Tories laugh at.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Labour is no longer the party of the working class, first it lost many of them to UKIP and now it has lost lots of them to the Boris Tories, indeed under Starmer Labour members and voters are more middle class than the average Tory voter
It isn't as simple as that. The line between working class and middle class is significantly blurred.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
He’s offering the working classes his ear, and investment in working-class areas that have been neglected for years.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
Yet again, I'd like to thank the PB Tories for their regular advice on who should be the next Labour leader. Today there have been recommendations for Andy Burnham, Ed Balls and Dan Jarvis - interesting, it ebbs and flows a bit but they all have something in common. You Tories should have taken our advice and gone for Jeremy Hunt - we kept telling you Boris was a bad 'un.
Speculation is interesting, of course, but we are stuck with Starmer, for good or bad, for at least another year - he needs more than 14 months as Leader in a pandemic before fair and full assessment.
I'm also grateful for the advice that any mention, let alone discussion, of Israel/Palestine should not pass the lips of anybody connected to the Labour Party. The bad things going on over there are all over the news, but lefties should maintain a a Trappist silence, because Corbyn I assume. I take it we're still allowed to talk about China, as long as we say the right things?
Yes. The policing of who and what Labour should be about is getting rather tasty.
When we rule out all the things (and the people) that the various cops insist need to be dropped, we are left with something quite unusual as our offering for the next election - Nothing.
Does anyone else think the enthusiasm for Burnham is overdone and that he would not have an appeal outside traditional Labour ground, and especially would not come over well in the south? There is no perfect candidate, but others to be preferred, I suggest.
Just to repeat the stat from earlier - Burnham won every single ward in Greater Manchester, from Harpurhey to Hale. That's a pretty broad appeal he's managed to create.
Jeez. Every single ward? His appeal won't carry in other areas is precisely the point I was banging on about our current PM for months and months.
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
Yeah he will definitely do the trick in the red wall.......shakes head.
Objectively, he is probably capable of doing the job- though I suspect his time (if ever there was one) has passed. And whilst Leeds isn't proper red wall, it's northern.
But, yes, if the objection to Starmer is his lawyerly shenanigans to hurt precious Brexit, then Benn would be even worse. And, although it's unfair, the sins of the father would be repaid on the son.
Though the father would have supported Brexit , had he still been with us.
Bernard Ingham had it right, when he was Benn (senior)'s press secretary. Once, Ingahm was asked by Benn had said something. And Ingham said there was a very good reason- and that reason was that "the Minister was stark, staring mad."
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
He’s offering the working classes his ear, and investment in working-class areas that have been neglected for years.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
Of course. But now Brexit is over he is going to have to deliver the arbitrary "rocket fuel" which is a lot harder to "deliver" than Brexit because it's completely subjective.
The problem with promising everything to everyone is that you can't please everyone. That's why I don't think it's going to be plain sailing. When the conservatives are in power both locally and nationally and things don't improve, it's going to be a lot harder to blame Labour.
"We pride ourselves on not shying away from sensitive issues that other local politicians prefer not to discuss."
"Promotion of a unifying shared British identity."
Sufficient provision for the essential needs of the populace, otherwise preserving individual liberty."
No Labour votes here. Plenty for the "Eng Nat" Cons.
Seems a bit "motherhood and Apple Pie" as the Americans would say.
Are you against the British identity?
Are you against individual liberty?
Are you against discussing sensitive issues?
All meaningless phrases. Where's the beef?
I have little interest in them other than from the by-election betting angle. They have the air of hardcore Ukip to me (the guy who formed them certainly is) and I think they'll be breaking heavily Con. If you wish to make another bad call by thinking something else, by all means go for it.
I'm not making a call this time. I know nothing about them and if BXP were prepared to go Tory and not be neverTories then there seems to be little reason these won't do the same.
UKIP is dead so hardcore UKIP is meaningless, just as those words in bold you highlighted are meaningless. You've not said what they mean to you that Labour should be against instead of being meaningless guff.
It's dead as a party but not as an attitude. In this sense it's still a lot of people and where their votes are going these days is a significant factor shaping our politics.
Its dead as an attitude, we've left the EU. That was the unifying feature, beyond that they were just cranks.
What's left of the attitude?
What remains of their attitude is that its imagined nature forms a convenient balustrade behind which @kini can feel better about himself and condemn others.
What is the matter with you?
Ukip attracted a big vote in their prime. Not so long ago either. So where is that vote going now and what's driving it?
Surely a more fascinating topic for a politics site than how I happen to be feeling about myself.
Absolutely. So let the latter go as it manifests itself in a need to denigrate others insidiously and not so insidiously (depending upon how much prep you have done).
There really is no need to be insecure on here goodness knows we've all got our problems (me excepted). Just go with the political debate. We love you, really. You had cracking views on Trump and Hartlepool. Go with that.
It is a belief set also held by Scottish nationalists; a belief set that is about hatred of other people, division and at the more extreme end a menace with a threat of violence.
Scot Nat, though, I don't equate to that (although I know you do). For me, being genuinely about sovereign self-determination, it's not a malign movement. You can see this from the Scots posters on here.
Oh, absolutely - comments by Scots posters on these very boards make it perfectly clear there's nothing malign about Scottish Nationalism.
300 years of cheating bastards stealing from us.
you are talking to someone as thick as two short planks, he will not understand.
Liar
lying Westminster arses pretend there is a deficit when in fact it is just to hide fact they have borrowed cash and pretend it has been spent on Scotland. Mugs like you are taken in easily.
bollox , you lying dumb horse's arse PS: At least we are not Richard pullers.
Maybe not interesting for arseholes down south , but people in Scotland will be interested. Pompous twat.
Yet again, I'd like to thank the PB Tories for their regular advice on who should be the next Labour leader. Today there have been recommendations for Andy Burnham, Ed Balls and Dan Jarvis - interesting, it ebbs and flows a bit but they all have something in common. You Tories should have taken our advice and gone for Jeremy Hunt - we kept telling you Boris was a bad 'un.
I hate to tell you this but PB Tories do in fact give good and sincere advice to Labour supporters when it comes to picking leaders. If Labour listened to PB Tories they would probably be in goverment now, but instead Labour keeps picking people PB Tories laugh at.
I think PB Tories warned that Corbyn was a dud who wouldn't win, warned that Starmer was a dud, warned that Ed was a dud. Labour didn't defenestrate any of them, the PB Tories were right, so the Tories won every election as a result.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
Boris isn't trying to hide that he's of the elite or pretend otherwise. It's one of the reasons he comes across as genuine despite every word he says being a pack of lies. When Sir Keir Starmer QC tries to tell us he's the son of a working class toolmaker it just isn't genuine because about three seconds of fact checking shows that he's the son of an industrialist factory owner. Dave struggled with this as well, he always tried to do his "call me Dave, I support West Ham, wait I mean Aston Villa" schtick and it didn't really hit home then either and people were easily able to see he was a but of a fake. It was actually on the NHS when he was strongest because he has that very personal experience with it due to the extensive care they gave to his disabled son. You could genuinely see that he really cared about the NHS and would ensure that the NHS was spared the worst of the coming austerity.
There isn't a single subject where Starmer has that impact. He hasn't got personal experiences that speak to the nation. To my mind, he's never really faced personal or professional adversity and it gives him lack of character/authenticity. One thing voters are very good at is spotting a fraud. Starmer is fake working class trying to appeal to them with learned lines and unknown experiences. Boris just doesn't bother to try, which is probably the better route IMO.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Labour is no longer the party of the working class, first it lost many of them to UKIP and now it has lost lots of them to the Boris Tories, indeed under Starmer Labour members and voters are more middle class than the average Tory voter
It's more complicated. There isn't an average Labour voter. That's their problem. They don't form a spectrum with a middle. They increasingly form separated enclaves. Some Guardianista posh, some urban less well off, some areas of high ethnic minority. The middle or average position between that triangle is less posh, less highly educated, fewer ethnic minorities in the population, less urbanised. That's called a Tory voter, except in what's left of the red wall.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
He’s offering the working classes his ear, and investment in working-class areas that have been neglected for years.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
Of course. But now Brexit is over he is going to have to deliver the arbitrary "rocket fuel" which is a lot harder to "deliver" than Brexit because it's completely subjective.
The problem with promising everything to everyone is that you can't please everyone. That's why I don't think it's going to be plain sailing. When the conservatives are in power both locally and nationally and things don't improve, it's going to be a lot harder to blame Labour.
Of course they now have to deliver, but it’s a low bar to cross and the signs so far are positive.
Yet again, I'd like to thank the PB Tories for their regular advice on who should be the next Labour leader. Today there have been recommendations for Andy Burnham, Ed Balls and Dan Jarvis - interesting, it ebbs and flows a bit but they all have something in common. You Tories should have taken our advice and gone for Jeremy Hunt - we kept telling you Boris was a bad 'un.
Speculation is interesting, of course, but we are stuck with Starmer, for good or bad, for at least another year - he needs more than 14 months as Leader in a pandemic before fair and full assessment.
I'm also grateful for the advice that any mention, let alone discussion, of Israel/Palestine should not pass the lips of anybody connected to the Labour Party. The bad things going on over there are all over the news, but lefties should maintain a a Trappist silence, because Corbyn I assume. I take it we're still allowed to talk about China, as long as we say the right things?
Don't know about other PB Tories, but you'll get no such silly arguments from me. Dear Keir should be given all the time he needs as LOTO - a decade, if he wants it - and the more of it he spends talking about Palestine, the better.
When labour get a leader who says to their MPs when did you become the member for Gaza Strip South? the tories need to worry.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
He’s offering the working classes his ear, and investment in working-class areas that have been neglected for years.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
Much of that is true but the last sentence is not. The parties are neck and neck amongst workers, the Tory lead is almost exclusively with those who no longer work.
It is a belief set also held by Scottish nationalists; a belief set that is about hatred of other people, division and at the more extreme end a menace with a threat of violence.
Scot Nat, though, I don't equate to that (although I know you do). For me, being genuinely about sovereign self-determination, it's not a malign movement. You can see this from the Scots posters on here.
Oh, absolutely - comments by Scots posters on these very boards make it perfectly clear there's nothing malign about Scottish Nationalism.
300 years of cheating bastards stealing from us.
you are talking to someone as thick as two short planks, he will not understand.
Liar
lying Westminster arses pretend there is a deficit when in fact it is just to hide fact they have borrowed cash and pretend it has been spent on Scotland. Mugs like you are taken in easily.
bollox , you lying dumb horse's arse PS: At least we are not Richard pullers.
Maybe not interesting for arseholes down south , but people in Scotland will be interested. Pompous twat.
Opposition Leader Satisfied Dissatisfied Net satisfaction Date of poll % % % Thatcher 38 51 -13 Nov 1978 Foot 13 69 -56 Aug 1982 Kinnock 27 61 -34 Dec 1988 Smith 33 41 -8 May 1993 Blair 42 35 +7 Sep 1996 Hague 19 56 -37 Jan 2000 Duncan Smith 16 53 -37 Feb 2003 Howard 23 49 -26 Jun 2005 Cameron 23 45 -22 Sep 2007 Miliband 25 63 -38 Dec 2014 Corbyn 17 72 -55 Feb 2019 Either it's a blip, or Starmer's toast.
The only saving grace for Starmer is that the last 14 months the polls have been largely driven by the pandemic.
If this is the norm for the post pandemic phase then he's like a stepmom on Pornhub.
The only question is does the PLP have the desire to remove him?
I keep coming back to the question, that nobody's really answered - who would you replace him with?
Major Dan Jarvis.
Well quite. Personable, sane, doesn't keep banging on about Palestine. But does he want the job? All the signs I've seen are that he doesn't.
I've never heard Dan Jarvis speak, or what he really is like. All I know is that he was in the armed forces and that is why many think he could be good for Labour. The image of an ex squaddie might play well with the public. Other than that I don't know.
He's not strictly speaking a squaddie. He was an officer. BUT, and it's quite a big but, no one really thinks like that when you're talking about a Para or a Marine. He was the former. Pretty hard core.
I've a Labour friend from Barnsley who has been banging on about Jarvis for what feels like years and years.
How's Jarvis going to get past the membership vote though? Surely he will be viewed with suspicion by the bien pensants of N London and Middling University Labour club?
I just looked ta his Wiki page. he looks far too electable to be elected to Labour Leader. Absolutely no chance.
The next leader absolutely must be a woman apparently.
Hope you're not somebody who manages to ridicule Labour (i) for never having a woman leader and (ii) for thinking they have to pick a woman leader.
Because some people do manage that, would you believe.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
He’s offering the working classes his ear, and investment in working-class areas that have been neglected for years.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
Of course. But now Brexit is over he is going to have to deliver the arbitrary "rocket fuel" which is a lot harder to "deliver" than Brexit because it's completely subjective.
The problem with promising everything to everyone is that you can't please everyone. That's why I don't think it's going to be plain sailing. When the conservatives are in power both locally and nationally and things don't improve, it's going to be a lot harder to blame Labour.
Of course they now have to deliver, but it’s a low bar to cross and the signs so far are positive.
But it isn't a low bar at all.
Labour 1997-2010 piled record sums into education, healthcare, infrastructure, and yet got zero thanks. That's just politics. It will never be enough.
And then at what point does the spending need to be reined in?
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
He comes from a pretty ordinary background. Corbyn's was more comfortable.
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Excuse me while I don't.
Well that's what happens unfortunately. A leader does a bit badly, and gets any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, citing as evidence the fact that he's getting any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, which makes people think he's not doing very well, which leads to poorer opinion polls. All quite unfair and the same thing happened to IDS and indeed Ed Miliband.
His background doesn't really matter of course. I'm sure we agree on that. Effective politicians can come from any background; those from tougher backgrounds have more hurdles to getting to the top, but those that do have a valuable insight. He's certainly from 'ordinary' origins, for a value of 'ordinary' that encompasses the middle 60% of the population - as am I, probably. Nothing wrong with that. But it wasn't quite the background I had been led to believe he was from. I'm not piling in, inasmuch as what I say or do has any impact at all, which it doesn't. I think he's ok. Not great, but ok. Exudes dull competence, which is a much underrated quality (is he competent? I've no idea). Has done some stuff that I've welcomed and some stuff I've lamented. This does, though, put a slightly different take on the discussion from last night in which we were mildly incredulous that he rated lower than Boris for honesty.
EDIT: Note that all the evidence we have for this snippet so far is a Guido tweet, so this is all a bit speculative. Not enough to base any sort of case on!
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Labour is no longer the party of the working class, first it lost many of them to UKIP and now it has lost lots of them to the Boris Tories, indeed under Starmer Labour members and voters are more middle class than the average Tory voter
It isn't as simple as that. The line between working class and middle class is significantly blurred.
I think a problem Labour has had since Blair, they too often frame everything as the rich vs the poor oppressed. Thatcher and Blair framed it as we want the working class to move to middle class, we are comfortable about people getting rich, work hard, be rewarded, that's fine with us.
There seem too often the Labour narrative especially of people up North they are all poor (plus whisper thick racists) and they need our help. They need the free wifi, the free this, the free that. Rather than people wanting the safety net to be there should it goes tits up, but we really just to know if I work hard, my kids school will be decent, crime won't be out of control etc.
Does anyone else think the enthusiasm for Burnham is overdone and that he would not have an appeal outside traditional Labour ground, and especially would not come over well in the south? There is no perfect candidate, but others to be preferred, I suggest.
Just to repeat the stat from earlier - Burnham won every single ward in Greater Manchester, from Harpurhey to Hale. That's a pretty broad appeal he's managed to create.
He would work well as part of a one-two strategy with the Lib Dems taking ground in the home counties. He'd still get the inner city seats in London and other cities, he'd be pretty handy at winning back Northern support, but he might not go down so well in the rural South (though he's much more palatable than Corbyn) but that could simply allow Lib Dems to capitalise.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Labour is no longer the party of the working class, first it lost many of them to UKIP and now it has lost lots of them to the Boris Tories, indeed under Starmer Labour members and voters are more middle class than the average Tory voter
It isn't as simple as that. The line between working class and middle class is significantly blurred.
I think a problem Labour has had since Blair, they too often frame everything as the rich vs the poor oppressed. Thatcher and Blair framed it as we want the working class to move to middle class, we are comfortable about people getting rich, work hard, be rewarded, that's fine with us.
There seem too often the Labour narrative especially of people up North they are all poor (plus whisper thick racists) and they need our help. They need the free wifi, the free this, the free that. Rather than people wanting the safety net to be there should it goes tits up, but we really just to know if I work hard, my kids school will be decent, crime won't be out of control etc.
Opposition Leader Satisfied Dissatisfied Net satisfaction Date of poll % % % Thatcher 38 51 -13 Nov 1978 Foot 13 69 -56 Aug 1982 Kinnock 27 61 -34 Dec 1988 Smith 33 41 -8 May 1993 Blair 42 35 +7 Sep 1996 Hague 19 56 -37 Jan 2000 Duncan Smith 16 53 -37 Feb 2003 Howard 23 49 -26 Jun 2005 Cameron 23 45 -22 Sep 2007 Miliband 25 63 -38 Dec 2014 Corbyn 17 72 -55 Feb 2019 Either it's a blip, or Starmer's toast.
The only saving grace for Starmer is that the last 14 months the polls have been largely driven by the pandemic.
If this is the norm for the post pandemic phase then he's like a stepmom on Pornhub.
The only question is does the PLP have the desire to remove him?
I keep coming back to the question, that nobody's really answered - who would you replace him with?
Major Dan Jarvis.
Well quite. Personable, sane, doesn't keep banging on about Palestine. But does he want the job? All the signs I've seen are that he doesn't.
I've never heard Dan Jarvis speak, or what he really is like. All I know is that he was in the armed forces and that is why many think he could be good for Labour. The image of an ex squaddie might play well with the public. Other than that I don't know.
He's not strictly speaking a squaddie. He was an officer. BUT, and it's quite a big but, no one really thinks like that when you're talking about a Para or a Marine. He was the former. Pretty hard core.
I've a Labour friend from Barnsley who has been banging on about Jarvis for what feels like years and years.
How's Jarvis going to get past the membership vote though? Surely he will be viewed with suspicion by the bien pensants of N London and Middling University Labour club?
I just looked ta his Wiki page. he looks far too electable to be elected to Labour Leader. Absolutely no chance.
The next leader absolutely must be a woman apparently.
Hope you're not somebody who manages to ridicule Labour (i) for never having a woman leader and (ii) for thinking they have to pick a woman leader.
Because some people do manage that, would you believe.
Its entirely possible and consistent to ridicule Labour for both. The Tories have had a woman leader elected who was a tremendous success who was elected because of her own merits, not because she was a woman.
Labour should not pick a leader just because she's female, but equally true to say there ought to have been plenty of good quality female MPs who could have become leader down the years.
It is up to the leader of the party that held the seat before the vacancy arose, to choose date of the by-election. So Boris chooses date for Chesham & Amersham and Keir for Batley & Spen. However, I wonder if they'll be scheduled for the same date?
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
He’s offering the working classes his ear, and investment in working-class areas that have been neglected for years.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
Of course. But now Brexit is over he is going to have to deliver the arbitrary "rocket fuel" which is a lot harder to "deliver" than Brexit because it's completely subjective.
The problem with promising everything to everyone is that you can't please everyone. That's why I don't think it's going to be plain sailing. When the conservatives are in power both locally and nationally and things don't improve, it's going to be a lot harder to blame Labour.
Of course they now have to deliver, but it’s a low bar to cross and the signs so far are positive.
But it isn't a low bar at all.
Labour 1997-2010 piled record sums into education, healthcare, infrastructure, and yet got zero thanks. That's just politics. It will never be enough.
And then at what point does the spending need to be reined in?
They did get some thanks. Big majorities in 01 and 05. (Though the taps were only really turned on after 01. And they only won so big in 05 due to some very efficient vote distribution. So maybe they didn't get thanks.)
But you're broadly right: no-one gets thanks. Look at Churchill in 1945. People vote for what you will do, not what you have done.
On the working class/middle class blurred lines, my parents were both 2nd generation immigrants. My dad grew up on a North Shields council estate and was the first in his family to go to university. His younger brother went to prison for steeling cars because he got involved in the wrong crowd.
My mum grew up in North London and was the daughter of a black cab driver. She was also the first in her family to go to university. It is at university where my parents met.
Because of the nature of the time, 2 university graduates (with low degree classifications, I might add) had well paid graduate jobs and could afford to buy a house together in affluent Solihull and I grew up fairly middle class by all accounts. My dad was the stereotypical "Mondeo man".
I of course went to University myself (twice, as you all know).
Now obviously I am middle class by most definitions but I don't feel wealthy whatsoever. I only managed to buy a house because my mum had the gall to die of cancer so I got a little inheritance early.
That level of social mobility is pretty much gone I reckon.
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
Yeah he will definitely do the trick in the red wall.......shakes head.
Objectively, he is probably capable of doing the job- though I suspect his time (if ever there was one) has passed. And whilst Leeds isn't proper red wall, it's northern.
But, yes, if the objection to Starmer is his lawyerly shenanigans to hurt precious Brexit, then Benn would be even worse. And, although it's unfair, the sins of the father would be repaid on the son.
Wedgie would have been for Brexit.
It is one of the contortions of the left that their most recent saints - Tony Benn and Jezza - shared an intense dislike of the EU, while very large numbers of their woke disciples seem not to have got the message.
Hilary Benn would be a good leader - but appears not to be interested.
Yeah he will definitely do the trick in the red wall.......shakes head.
Boris will have a bus in every leave seat with Benn face on saying "his man did everything he could to stop Brexit".
HB is almost as wooden as Starmer.
I like Hilary Benn. I met him in a lift once, which got briefly stuck. It was one of those awkward situations you get when you meet a famous person: all the normal pleasantries you might make go out of the window because YOU KNOW WHO THEY ARE. Where are you from? What do you do? All useless. You already know the answer. Nor can you just launch into an introduction of yourself bringing the famous person up to speed with who you are to even up the imbalance, because that would feel insane, and they are already slightly nervous about who they are in the lift with and for how long they will be there. In the end we shared mild quips about what we hoped to have for lunch. Anyway, I like Hilary, Do you remember that speech about the bombing of Syria? It was quite good. Though not necessarily one to endear him to the membership.
Labour's Batley And Spen Candidate 'Must Be Working Class', Keir Starmer Told
Ian Lavery, Jon Trickett and Laura Smith draw battle lines as fallout from Hartlepool defeat continue
The joint statement from Lavery’s No Holding Back group, said Starmer must select someone with a working class background, and ideally a key worker, and “not repeat the errors that brought us such a humiliating defeat” in Hartlepool.
While unable to categorically define what was meant by “working class”, the group said it welcomed a debate with the Labour leadership on the issue.
One definition being looked at by the group was “people who have to work in order to provide sufficiently for themselves and their families”.
That's a remarkably wide definition of working class. Must encompass 80% plus of the working age population.
Was the Labour candidate in Hartlepool a key worker?
He's a GP so yes.
Only the Labour party in its current crisis could decide to spend the time post-local elections having an internal debate about what is meant by the term 'working class'.
Beyond parody now.
It's completely ridiculous. How have Labour got into a position where they don't even know what it is to be working class.
I don't think that's fair. As I've previously argued here, "working class" now means different things to different people. A plumber in Durham earning 50k+ and owns a 3 bed semi probably thinks they're working class. A vegan paralegal in London earning 20k and renting with 6 other people probably thinks they're working class too...
The vegan paralegal definitely doesn't think they're working class.
They certainly do, like, and why shouldn't they?
As in their eyes it would mean identifying themselves as the same class as non graduate, Brexit voting, now Tory voting, oiks
That doesn't even make sense.
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
In British terms it is largely down to education and social background, eg Alan Sugar will always be considered to be more working class than a public school educated philosophy professor however much money he has made.
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I feel like you haven't got a clue what you're talking about. You've literally invented a caricature.
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
Labour is no longer the party of the working class, first it lost many of them to UKIP and now it has lost lots of them to the Boris Tories, indeed under Starmer Labour members and voters are more middle class than the average Tory voter
It isn't as simple as that. The line between working class and middle class is significantly blurred.
I think a problem Labour has had since Blair, they too often frame everything as the rich vs the poor oppressed. Thatcher and Blair framed it as we want the working class to move to middle class, we are comfortable about people getting rich, work hard, be rewarded, that's fine with us.
There seem too often the Labour narrative especially of people up North they are all poor (plus whisper thick racists) and they need our help. They need the free wifi, the free this, the free that. Rather than people wanting the safety net to be there should it goes tits up, but we really just to know if I work hard, my kids school will be decent, crime won't be out of control etc.
There is much in that. One point I'd add, and this is not just a Labour problem, is the talk of jobs needed. Jobs aren't in short supply. (Full employment for the first time in several generations is part of the explanation for Tory success in the NE). London had the highest unemployment in the country pre-pandemic. Opportunities to go to University, return to your home town and get a graduate job. That's what's in short supply.
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
He comes from a pretty ordinary background. Corbyn's was more comfortable.
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Excuse me while I don't.
Well that's what happens unfortunately. A leader does a bit badly, and gets any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, citing as evidence the fact that he's getting any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, which makes people think he's not doing very well, which leads to poorer opinion polls. All quite unfair and the same thing happened to IDS and indeed Ed Miliband.
His background doesn't really matter of course. I'm sure we agree on that. Effective politicians can come from any background; those from tougher backgrounds have more hurdles to getting to the top, but those that do have a valuable insight. He's certainly from 'ordinary' origins, for a value of 'ordinary' that encompasses the middle 60% of the population - as am I, probably. Nothing wrong with that. But it wasn't quite the background I had been led to believe he was from. I'm not piling in, inasmuch as what I say or do has any impact at all, which it doesn't. I think he's ok. Not great, but ok. Exudes dull competence, which is a much underrated quality (is he competent? I've no idea). Has done some stuff that I've welcomed and some stuff I've lamented. This does, though, put a slightly different take on the discussion from last night in which we were mildly incredulous that he rated lower than Boris for honesty.
EDIT: Note that all the evidence we have for this snippet so far is a Guido tweet, so this is all a bit speculative. Not enough to base any sort of case on!
I am a bit worried, in truth. I'm not going with the flow right now because I think there's some mindless herd stuff going on, which I dislike, and is also potentially bad for betting. My fear about Starmer (who I didn't vote for) is he might be too corporate to connect with the public. People want some "shirt out" these days. Whatever policies come forth, left or centrist, have to be sold and if he can't do that we'll have to make a change.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
Boris isn't trying to hide that he's of the elite or pretend otherwise. It's one of the reasons he comes across as genuine despite every word he says being a pack of lies. When Sir Keir Starmer QC tries to tell us he's the son of a working class toolmaker it just isn't genuine because about three seconds of fact checking shows that he's the son of an industrialist factory owner. Dave struggled with this as well, he always tried to do his "call me Dave, I support West Ham, wait I mean Aston Villa" schtick and it didn't really hit home then either and people were easily able to see he was a but of a fake. It was actually on the NHS when he was strongest because he has that very personal experience with it due to the extensive care they gave to his disabled son. You could genuinely see that he really cared about the NHS and would ensure that the NHS was spared the worst of the coming austerity.
There isn't a single subject where Starmer has that impact. He hasn't got personal experiences that speak to the nation. To my mind, he's never really faced personal or professional adversity and it gives him lack of character/authenticity. One thing voters are very good at is spotting a fraud. Starmer is fake working class trying to appeal to them with learned lines and unknown experiences. Boris just doesn't bother to try, which is probably the better route IMO.
Where is the actual quote/source that his father owned the factory. All I can find is "ran the factory".
Do we know who exactly is banned from PB , either temporarily or permanently?
Can think of at least one rather prolific poster who is nowhere to be seen at present.
Of course people can and do got AWOL for various reasons of their own, ranging from ennui (me), computer trouble (ditto), long vacations, even longer custodial sentences or seemingly endless expeditions to the wilds of East Africa or West Wokeshire.
Do we know who exactly is banned from PB , either temporarily or permanently?
Can think of at least one rather prolific poster who is nowhere to be seen at present.
Of course people can and do got AWOL for various reasons of their own, ranging from ennui (me), computer trouble (ditto), long vacations, even longer custodial sentences or seemingly endless expeditions to the wilds of East Africa or West Wokeshire.
If you click on their profile their avatar will say User Banned if they are. I think
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
Boris isn't trying to hide that he's of the elite or pretend otherwise. It's one of the reasons he comes across as genuine despite every word he says being a pack of lies. When Sir Keir Starmer QC tries to tell us he's the son of a working class toolmaker it just isn't genuine because about three seconds of fact checking shows that he's the son of an industrialist factory owner. Dave struggled with this as well, he always tried to do his "call me Dave, I support West Ham, wait I mean Aston Villa" schtick and it didn't really hit home then either and people were easily able to see he was a but of a fake. It was actually on the NHS when he was strongest because he has that very personal experience with it due to the extensive care they gave to his disabled son. You could genuinely see that he really cared about the NHS and would ensure that the NHS was spared the worst of the coming austerity.
There isn't a single subject where Starmer has that impact. He hasn't got personal experiences that speak to the nation. To my mind, he's never really faced personal or professional adversity and it gives him lack of character/authenticity. One thing voters are very good at is spotting a fraud. Starmer is fake working class trying to appeal to them with learned lines and unknown experiences. Boris just doesn't bother to try, which is probably the better route IMO.
Where is the actual quote/source that his father owned the factory. All I can find is "ran the factory".
I'm more intrigued by the snippet that SKS took violin lessons with Fatboy Slim. Funk soul brother.
I'm not sure this is the zinger you think it is. The self-employed and small business owners are the bedrock of the new northern Conservative vote. They still think they're working class. What matters is getting "stuck in" to the graft.
Oh, absolutely. The backbone of our economy. I think it's hugely positive to have a LOTO with a background with an understanding of small business. I certainly don't want to get all class war. But if it's true, it's a jarringly different picture to the one I understood to be true - presumably because it was how Kier wanted to be portrayed, though I grant I don't think I've ever heard about his background from him personally.
The problem with it, is that the Tory Facebook campaign ads at the next election write themselves. Sir Keir likes you tell you he grew up in a factory worker’s house, but didn’t tell you his father owned the factory and sent him to the good school. What is he offering today’s working classes other than sneering contempt?
That isn't fatal. Boris Johnson is quite literally the elite. What is he offering today's working classes?
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
Boris isn't trying to hide that he's of the elite or pretend otherwise. It's one of the reasons he comes across as genuine despite every word he says being a pack of lies. When Sir Keir Starmer QC tries to tell us he's the son of a working class toolmaker it just isn't genuine because about three seconds of fact checking shows that he's the son of an industrialist factory owner. Dave struggled with this as well, he always tried to do his "call me Dave, I support West Ham, wait I mean Aston Villa" schtick and it didn't really hit home then either and people were easily able to see he was a but of a fake. It was actually on the NHS when he was strongest because he has that very personal experience with it due to the extensive care they gave to his disabled son. You could genuinely see that he really cared about the NHS and would ensure that the NHS was spared the worst of the coming austerity.
There isn't a single subject where Starmer has that impact. He hasn't got personal experiences that speak to the nation. To my mind, he's never really faced personal or professional adversity and it gives him lack of character/authenticity. One thing voters are very good at is spotting a fraud. Starmer is fake working class trying to appeal to them with learned lines and unknown experiences. Boris just doesn't bother to try, which is probably the better route IMO.
Where is the actual quote/source that his father owned the factory. All I can find is "ran the factory".
I'm more intrigued by the snippet that SKS took violin lessons with Fatboy Slim. Funk soul brother.
Check it out now. Now that's pretty cool. He could definitely meme the Fatboy Slim connection.
On the working class/middle class blurred lines, my parents were both 2nd generation immigrants. My dad grew up on a North Shields council estate and was the first in his family to go to university. His younger brother went to prison for steeling cars because he got involved in the wrong crowd.
My mum grew up in North London and was the daughter of a black cab driver. She was also the first in her family to go to university. It is at university where my parents met.
Because of the nature of the time, 2 university graduates (with low degree classifications, I might add) had well paid graduate jobs and could afford to buy a house together in affluent Solihull and I grew up fairly middle class by all accounts. My dad was the stereotypical "Mondeo man".
I of course went to University myself (twice, as you all know).
Now obviously I am middle class by most definitions but I don't feel wealthy whatsoever. I only managed to buy a house because my mum had the gall to die of cancer so I got a little inheritance early.
That level of social mobility is pretty much gone I reckon.
When I graduated, only 10% went to university but there was plenty of social mobility.
As university proportions ballooned it seems social mobility plunged.
I'm not sure the two are even linked, but it makes you think.
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
He comes from a pretty ordinary background. Corbyn's was more comfortable.
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Excuse me while I don't.
Well that's what happens unfortunately. A leader does a bit badly, and gets any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, citing as evidence the fact that he's getting any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, which makes people think he's not doing very well, which leads to poorer opinion polls. All quite unfair and the same thing happened to IDS and indeed Ed Miliband.
His background doesn't really matter of course. I'm sure we agree on that. Effective politicians can come from any background; those from tougher backgrounds have more hurdles to getting to the top, but those that do have a valuable insight. He's certainly from 'ordinary' origins, for a value of 'ordinary' that encompasses the middle 60% of the population - as am I, probably. Nothing wrong with that. But it wasn't quite the background I had been led to believe he was from. I'm not piling in, inasmuch as what I say or do has any impact at all, which it doesn't. I think he's ok. Not great, but ok. Exudes dull competence, which is a much underrated quality (is he competent? I've no idea). Has done some stuff that I've welcomed and some stuff I've lamented. This does, though, put a slightly different take on the discussion from last night in which we were mildly incredulous that he rated lower than Boris for honesty.
EDIT: Note that all the evidence we have for this snippet so far is a Guido tweet, so this is all a bit speculative. Not enough to base any sort of case on!
I am a bit worried, in truth. I'm not going with the flow right now because I think there's some mindless herd stuff going on, which I dislike, and is also potentially bad for betting. My fear about Starmer (who I didn't vote for) is he might be too corporate to connect with the public. People want some "shirt out" these days. Whatever policies come forth, left or centrist, have to be sold and if he can't do that we'll have to make a change.
Starmer seeks to be a second Blair. He has Mandelson and Mattison working closely with him. See Mandleson's words the other day: "lose, lose, lose, lose, Blair, Blair, Blair, Lose, Lose, lose, lose".
The direction he is going is the right one if you want the LP to maximise electability but the wrong one if you seek honesty and authenticity.
Do we know who exactly is banned from PB , either temporarily or permanently?
Can think of at least one rather prolific poster who is nowhere to be seen at present.
Of course people can and do got AWOL for various reasons of their own, ranging from ennui (me), computer trouble (ditto), long vacations, even longer custodial sentences or seemingly endless expeditions to the wilds of East Africa or West Wokeshire.
If you click on their profile their avatar will say User Banned if they are. I think
Interesting. So where do you find a list of avatars, since they will by definition not be on threads from which they are banned? Just scan through past posts?
(Think there used to be a link for PB archives, but don't see it now.)
On the working class/middle class blurred lines, my parents were both 2nd generation immigrants. My dad grew up on a North Shields council estate and was the first in his family to go to university. His younger brother went to prison for steeling cars because he got involved in the wrong crowd.
My mum grew up in North London and was the daughter of a black cab driver. She was also the first in her family to go to university. It is at university where my parents met.
Because of the nature of the time, 2 university graduates (with low degree classifications, I might add) had well paid graduate jobs and could afford to buy a house together in affluent Solihull and I grew up fairly middle class by all accounts. My dad was the stereotypical "Mondeo man".
I of course went to University myself (twice, as you all know).
Now obviously I am middle class by most definitions but I don't feel wealthy whatsoever. I only managed to buy a house because my mum had the gall to die of cancer so I got a little inheritance early.
That level of social mobility is pretty much gone I reckon.
When I graduated, only 10% went to university but there was plenty of social mobility.
As university proportions ballooned it seems social mobility plunged.
I'm not sure the two are even linked, but it makes you think.
All 50% going to university has done is made hidden youth unemployment for 3 years.
"We pride ourselves on not shying away from sensitive issues that other local politicians prefer not to discuss."
"Promotion of a unifying shared British identity."
Sufficient provision for the essential needs of the populace, otherwise preserving individual liberty."
No Labour votes here. Plenty for the "Eng Nat" Cons.
Seems a bit "motherhood and Apple Pie" as the Americans would say.
Are you against the British identity?
Are you against individual liberty?
Are you against discussing sensitive issues?
All meaningless phrases. Where's the beef?
I have little interest in them other than from the by-election betting angle. They have the air of hardcore Ukip to me (the guy who formed them certainly is) and I think they'll be breaking heavily Con. If you wish to make another bad call by thinking something else, by all means go for it.
I'm not making a call this time. I know nothing about them and if BXP were prepared to go Tory and not be neverTories then there seems to be little reason these won't do the same.
UKIP is dead so hardcore UKIP is meaningless, just as those words in bold you highlighted are meaningless. You've not said what they mean to you that Labour should be against instead of being meaningless guff.
It's dead as a party but not as an attitude. In this sense it's still a lot of people and where their votes are going these days is a significant factor shaping our politics.
Its dead as an attitude, we've left the EU. That was the unifying feature, beyond that they were just cranks.
What's left of the attitude?
What remains of their attitude is that its imagined nature forms a convenient balustrade behind which @kini can feel better about himself and condemn others.
What is the matter with you?
Ukip attracted a big vote in their prime. Not so long ago either. So where is that vote going now and what's driving it?
Surely a more fascinating topic for a politics site than how I happen to be feeling about myself.
Absolutely. So let the latter go as it manifests itself in a need to denigrate others insidiously and not so insidiously (depending upon how much prep you have done).
There really is no need to be insecure on here goodness knows we've all got our problems (me excepted). Just go with the political debate. We love you, really. You had cracking views on Trump and Hartlepool. Go with that.
I seem to have upset you and I genuinely don't know why. If you wish to drop the obliquery and tell me what it is, I'll take it seriously and see if I can uncross the wires.
Is that really true? Kier Starmer's dad owned the factory?
I mean, of course, I don't think ill of him for having a middle class background. I have a middle class background. But he's always seemed fairly keen to let it be known he came from working class (sorry) origins.
He comes from a pretty ordinary background. Corbyn's was more comfortable.
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Excuse me while I don't.
Well that's what happens unfortunately. A leader does a bit badly, and gets any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, citing as evidence the fact that he's getting any number of headlines about how badly he's doing, which makes people think he's not doing very well, which leads to poorer opinion polls. All quite unfair and the same thing happened to IDS and indeed Ed Miliband.
His background doesn't really matter of course. I'm sure we agree on that. Effective politicians can come from any background; those from tougher backgrounds have more hurdles to getting to the top, but those that do have a valuable insight. He's certainly from 'ordinary' origins, for a value of 'ordinary' that encompasses the middle 60% of the population - as am I, probably. Nothing wrong with that. But it wasn't quite the background I had been led to believe he was from. I'm not piling in, inasmuch as what I say or do has any impact at all, which it doesn't. I think he's ok. Not great, but ok. Exudes dull competence, which is a much underrated quality (is he competent? I've no idea). Has done some stuff that I've welcomed and some stuff I've lamented. This does, though, put a slightly different take on the discussion from last night in which we were mildly incredulous that he rated lower than Boris for honesty.
EDIT: Note that all the evidence we have for this snippet so far is a Guido tweet, so this is all a bit speculative. Not enough to base any sort of case on!
I am a bit worried, in truth. I'm not going with the flow right now because I think there's some mindless herd stuff going on, which I dislike, and is also potentially bad for betting. My fear about Starmer (who I didn't vote for) is he might be too corporate to connect with the public. People want some "shirt out" these days. Whatever policies come forth, left or centrist, have to be sold and if he can't do that we'll have to make a change.
Starmer seeks to be a second Blair. He has Mandelson and Mattison working closely with him. See Mandleson's words the other day: "lose, lose, lose, lose, Blair, Blair, Blair, Lose, Lose, lose, lose".
The direction he is going is the right one if you want the LP to maximise electability but the wrong one if you seek honesty and authenticity.
Taking out Cheney (R-Wyo.) as conference chair was never going to be clean and easy for [US House GOP Minority Leader Kevin] McCarthy. And this week, we’re starting to pick up on a bit of backlash against the minority leader behind the scenes. Some House Republicans are privately griping about how the California Republican has fed a colleague to the MAGA wolves in his quest to become speaker.
And no, we’re not just hearing this from ADAM KINZINGER types.
McCarthy has sought to cast doubt on Cheney’s leadership ability, arguing that it is essentially selfish to call out Trump instead of prioritizing GOP unity. But other House Republicans question his own leadership qualities.
One of them — a Republican long seen as an ally of leadership — told us Monday night he may oppose McCarthy for speaker because of all the recent drama. This person accused McCarthy of having no moral compass as he moves to punish Cheney while allowing members like Reps. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-Ga.) and MATT GAETZ (R-Fla.) to run wild.
“Kevin McCarthy has pissed off enough members of his own conference that he’s going to have to go back to his former days as a whip to try to figure out where his votes are” to become speaker, said the member, who is neither a member of the Freedom Caucus nor a moderate. “I’d be worried if I was him. … You have people like me — who are here to do the right thing for all the right reasons and have an expectation of leadership — that are, shall we say, disgusted with the internal squabbling that results from having weak leadership. And it is weak leadership. Straight up.”
A senior GOP aide to a conservative member put it this way: “He’s flip-flopped on [Jan. 6 and whether it’s] Trump’s fault, it’s not Trump’s fault. … It seems like he doesn’t have the backbone to lead. He bends to political pressure. It’s tough to do when you’re speaker. You have to lead.”
On the other end of the ideological spectrum, a group of conservatives feel like they’ve been boxed in with Rep. ELISE STEFANIK (R-N.Y.), as McCarthy moved to lock her in as Cheney’s replacement. McCarthy’s move to clear the field when others wanted to run for the job has upset some on the right, though Stefanik’s announcement that she would only serve for one term has assuaged some of these concerns.
McCarthy’s move against Cheney has arguably helped his standing with Trump, who was angered by the GOP leader’s initial decision to stand by her. But the former president is still lukewarm on McCarthy, we’re told, and loyalty with Trump often runs only one way.
Of course, the midterms are a long ways away, and helping to lead Republicans back to the House majority could go a long way with his critics. But while Cheney is the one getting canned this week, McCarthy won’t come out unscathed, either.
"We pride ourselves on not shying away from sensitive issues that other local politicians prefer not to discuss."
"Promotion of a unifying shared British identity."
Sufficient provision for the essential needs of the populace, otherwise preserving individual liberty."
No Labour votes here. Plenty for the "Eng Nat" Cons.
Seems a bit "motherhood and Apple Pie" as the Americans would say.
Are you against the British identity?
Are you against individual liberty?
Are you against discussing sensitive issues?
All meaningless phrases. Where's the beef?
I have little interest in them other than from the by-election betting angle. They have the air of hardcore Ukip to me (the guy who formed them certainly is) and I think they'll be breaking heavily Con. If you wish to make another bad call by thinking something else, by all means go for it.
I'm not making a call this time. I know nothing about them and if BXP were prepared to go Tory and not be neverTories then there seems to be little reason these won't do the same.
UKIP is dead so hardcore UKIP is meaningless, just as those words in bold you highlighted are meaningless. You've not said what they mean to you that Labour should be against instead of being meaningless guff.
It's dead as a party but not as an attitude. In this sense it's still a lot of people and where their votes are going these days is a significant factor shaping our politics.
Its dead as an attitude, we've left the EU. That was the unifying feature, beyond that they were just cranks.
What's left of the attitude?
What remains of their attitude is that its imagined nature forms a convenient balustrade behind which @kini can feel better about himself and condemn others.
What is the matter with you?
Ukip attracted a big vote in their prime. Not so long ago either. So where is that vote going now and what's driving it?
Surely a more fascinating topic for a politics site than how I happen to be feeling about myself.
Absolutely. So let the latter go as it manifests itself in a need to denigrate others insidiously and not so insidiously (depending upon how much prep you have done).
There really is no need to be insecure on here goodness knows we've all got our problems (me excepted). Just go with the political debate. We love you, really. You had cracking views on Trump and Hartlepool. Go with that.
I seem to have upset you and I genuinely don't know why. If you wish to drop the obliquery and tell me what it is, I'll take it seriously and see if I can uncross the wires.
LOL! Just can't help yourself.
As I said, relax, enjoy PB and grace us with your political insight which is not insubstantial rather than worrying about what we think of you. I have already noted, and I think I speak for all of PB, we love you.
Yet again, I'd like to thank the PB Tories for their regular advice on who should be the next Labour leader. Today there have been recommendations for Andy Burnham, Ed Balls and Dan Jarvis - interesting, it ebbs and flows a bit but they all have something in common. You Tories should have taken our advice and gone for Jeremy Hunt - we kept telling you Boris was a bad 'un.
Speculation is interesting, of course, but we are stuck with Starmer, for good or bad, for at least another year - he needs more than 14 months as Leader in a pandemic before fair and full assessment.
I'm also grateful for the advice that any mention, let alone discussion, of Israel/Palestine should not pass the lips of anybody connected to the Labour Party. The bad things going on over there are all over the news, but lefties should maintain a a Trappist silence, because Corbyn I assume. I take it we're still allowed to talk about China, as long as we say the right things?
Don't know about other PB Tories, but you'll get no such silly arguments from me. Dear Keir should be given all the time he needs as LOTO - a decade, if he wants it - and the more of it he spends talking about Palestine, the better.
When labour get a leader who says to their MPs when did you become the member for Gaza Strip South? the tories need to worry.
Comments
What even is "working class"? Is it just down to education? So even if you're from a Hartlepool ex-council estate you become middle class as soon as you graduate?
It's a nonsense.
Working class is just an identity and if rich self-employed plumbers from Co. Durham can claim to be working class, why not a low-paid graduate sharing with 6 other people and living from pay check to pay check?
https://twitter.com/JohnRentoul/status/1392131491757535235?s=20
https://twitter.com/GuidoFawkes/status/1392127828985057281?s=19
A vegan leftie would now no longer identify as working class anyway, as that would mean they identified with Brexit voting oiks, back when the working classes were also leftie and mainly Labour voting it was more cool to identify as working class against Thatcher, now if you identify as working class that means you are likely to be a Boris fan, yuck for the average leftie Londoner
I have never known a Labour supporter who is proudly "middle class". They are always proudly "working class" or silent on the matter.
But I predict with enormous confidence that the Labour GE offering will be more in the material interests of the people you are concerned about than the Tory one.
300 years of cheating bastards stealing from us.
you are talking to someone as thick as two short planks, he will not understand.
Liar
lying Westminster arses pretend there is a deficit when in fact it is just to hide fact they have borrowed cash and pretend it has been spent on Scotland. Mugs like you are taken in easily.
bollox , you lying dumb horse's arse PS: At least we are not Richard pullers.
Maybe not interesting for arseholes down south , but people in Scotland will be interested. Pompous twat.
- A lot along the lines of stuff @Cyclefree has a tendency to put in her thread headers.
- Equality before the law.
- A free and fair judicial system.
- A free and fair Parliamentary democracy.
- That all people, regardless of gender, race, sexual orientation, religion or anything else are free and equal.
- Welcoming anyone who comes to make this country their home.
- Generosity of spirit both at home and abroad. Giving aid to those who need it.
- That anyone who gets sick in this country will be looked after.
- Respecting the rights of others.
- Treating each other with respect.
- Settling our differences politely and democratically.
- Accepting that we may not always win or get our way, with grace and generosity of spirit.
On a more fun level.- Complaining about the weather, then losing our minds and enjoying ourselves when its sunny.
- Cheering on the Three Lions, only to see them eliminated by penalties.
- The England Cricket Team and taking on the Aussies in The Ashes.
- Wanting to beat the other Home Nations but coming together with them with Team GB.
And most importantly for allBoris will have a bus in every leave seat with Benn face on saying "his man did everything he could to stop Brexit".
What's happening right now is you have a guy who's down and under pressure, and people from all sides are piling in.
Excuse me while I don't.
If Keir can sort the Labour Party out (unlikely, but still), his background is not going to be relevant.
But, yes, if the objection to Starmer is his lawyerly shenanigans to hurt precious Brexit, then Benn would be even worse. And, although it's unfair, the sins of the father would be repaid on the son.
Just make Americans queue for 'gas'
The media and narrative will see to that
I am not convinced he will be LOTO by the end of this year
Cameron also got in some trouble when he tried to over egg the being a normal bloke, down Morrisons on a Saturday morning, before feet up to watch the West Aston Ham United on the box.
They did think she had other qualities. As do I, as it happens. Might be a bit exposed as leader if she's really not all that bright though.
Labour are talking to and about the bottom 10% and the top 10%.
The bottom 10% aren’t working, and the top 10% are at the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and like talking about Palestine and trans rights, because they’re not worried about owning a house or saving for retirement.
The Conservatives are talking to the 80% in the middle. Those who get up and go to work in the morning.
https://twitter.com/JGForsyth/status/1392111217171484679
Now, why would the Mayor of Greater Manchester want a column in a London evening newspaper?
When we rule out all the things (and the people) that the various cops insist need to be dropped, we are left with something quite unusual as our offering for the next election - Nothing.
His appeal won't carry in other areas is precisely the point I was banging on about our current PM for months and months.
They don't make them like that any more.
I’m currently writing a paper on it for a client who works in utilities. It’s a massive global issue, the targeting of such companies and systems.
The problem with promising everything to everyone is that you can't please everyone. That's why I don't think it's going to be plain sailing. When the conservatives are in power both locally and nationally and things don't improve, it's going to be a lot harder to blame Labour.
There really is no need to be insecure on here goodness knows we've all got our problems (me excepted). Just go with the political debate. We love you, really. You had cracking views on Trump and Hartlepool. Go with that.
What's the saying again? PB Tories, always right, we're always learning.
Dutch Christian-Democrats have been saying something similar for a year or so
https://twitter.com/remkorteweg/status/1392137254676705283?s=20
There isn't a single subject where Starmer has that impact. He hasn't got personal experiences that speak to the nation. To my mind, he's never really faced personal or professional adversity and it gives him lack of character/authenticity. One thing voters are very good at is spotting a fraud. Starmer is fake working class trying to appeal to them with learned lines and unknown experiences. Boris just doesn't bother to try, which is probably the better route IMO.
Shut the f8ck up about Palestine.
Because some people do manage that, would you believe.
Labour 1997-2010 piled record sums into education, healthcare, infrastructure, and yet got zero thanks. That's just politics. It will never be enough.
And then at what point does the spending need to be reined in?
His background doesn't really matter of course. I'm sure we agree on that. Effective politicians can come from any background; those from tougher backgrounds have more hurdles to getting to the top, but those that do have a valuable insight. He's certainly from 'ordinary' origins, for a value of 'ordinary' that encompasses the middle 60% of the population - as am I, probably. Nothing wrong with that. But it wasn't quite the background I had been led to believe he was from.
I'm not piling in, inasmuch as what I say or do has any impact at all, which it doesn't. I think he's ok. Not great, but ok. Exudes dull competence, which is a much underrated quality (is he competent? I've no idea). Has done some stuff that I've welcomed and some stuff I've lamented.
This does, though, put a slightly different take on the discussion from last night in which we were mildly incredulous that he rated lower than Boris for honesty.
EDIT: Note that all the evidence we have for this snippet so far is a Guido tweet, so this is all a bit speculative. Not enough to base any sort of case on!
There seem too often the Labour narrative especially of people up North they are all poor (plus whisper thick racists) and they need our help. They need the free wifi, the free this, the free that. Rather than people wanting the safety net to be there should it goes tits up, but we really just to know if I work hard, my kids school will be decent, crime won't be out of control etc.
Labour should not pick a leader just because she's female, but equally true to say there ought to have been plenty of good quality female MPs who could have become leader down the years.
But you're broadly right: no-one gets thanks. Look at Churchill in 1945. People vote for what you will do, not what you have done.
My mum grew up in North London and was the daughter of a black cab driver. She was also the first in her family to go to university. It is at university where my parents met.
Because of the nature of the time, 2 university graduates (with low degree classifications, I might add) had well paid graduate jobs and could afford to buy a house together in affluent Solihull and I grew up fairly middle class by all accounts. My dad was the stereotypical "Mondeo man".
I of course went to University myself (twice, as you all know).
Now obviously I am middle class by most definitions but I don't feel wealthy whatsoever. I only managed to buy a house because my mum had the gall to die of cancer so I got a little inheritance early.
That level of social mobility is pretty much gone I reckon.
In the end we shared mild quips about what we hoped to have for lunch.
Anyway, I like Hilary, Do you remember that speech about the bombing of Syria? It was quite good. Though not necessarily one to endear him to the membership.
Jobs aren't in short supply. (Full employment for the first time in several generations is part of the explanation for Tory success in the NE). London had the highest unemployment in the country pre-pandemic.
Opportunities to go to University, return to your home town and get a graduate job. That's what's in short supply.
Can think of at least one rather prolific poster who is nowhere to be seen at present.
Of course people can and do got AWOL for various reasons of their own, ranging from ennui (me), computer trouble (ditto), long vacations, even longer custodial sentences or seemingly endless expeditions to the wilds of East Africa or West Wokeshire.
Don't accept that one.
Funk soul brother.
As university proportions ballooned it seems social mobility plunged.
I'm not sure the two are even linked, but it makes you think.
The direction he is going is the right one if you want the LP to maximise electability but the wrong one if you seek honesty and authenticity.
(Think there used to be a link for PB archives, but don't see it now.)
https://www.politico.com/newsletters/playbook/2021/05/11/could-mccarthy-face-a-cheney-backlash-492797
Taking out Cheney (R-Wyo.) as conference chair was never going to be clean and easy for [US House GOP Minority Leader Kevin] McCarthy. And this week, we’re starting to pick up on a bit of backlash against the minority leader behind the scenes. Some House Republicans are privately griping about how the California Republican has fed a colleague to the MAGA wolves in his quest to become speaker.
And no, we’re not just hearing this from ADAM KINZINGER types.
McCarthy has sought to cast doubt on Cheney’s leadership ability, arguing that it is essentially selfish to call out Trump instead of prioritizing GOP unity. But other House Republicans question his own leadership qualities.
One of them — a Republican long seen as an ally of leadership — told us Monday night he may oppose McCarthy for speaker because of all the recent drama. This person accused McCarthy of having no moral compass as he moves to punish Cheney while allowing members like Reps. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-Ga.) and MATT GAETZ (R-Fla.) to run wild.
“Kevin McCarthy has pissed off enough members of his own conference that he’s going to have to go back to his former days as a whip to try to figure out where his votes are” to become speaker, said the member, who is neither a member of the Freedom Caucus nor a moderate. “I’d be worried if I was him. … You have people like me — who are here to do the right thing for all the right reasons and have an expectation of leadership — that are, shall we say, disgusted with the internal squabbling that results from having weak leadership. And it is weak leadership. Straight up.”
A senior GOP aide to a conservative member put it this way: “He’s flip-flopped on [Jan. 6 and whether it’s] Trump’s fault, it’s not Trump’s fault. … It seems like he doesn’t have the backbone to lead. He bends to political pressure. It’s tough to do when you’re speaker. You have to lead.”
On the other end of the ideological spectrum, a group of conservatives feel like they’ve been boxed in with Rep. ELISE STEFANIK (R-N.Y.), as McCarthy moved to lock her in as Cheney’s replacement. McCarthy’s move to clear the field when others wanted to run for the job has upset some on the right, though Stefanik’s announcement that she would only serve for one term has assuaged some of these concerns.
McCarthy’s move against Cheney has arguably helped his standing with Trump, who was angered by the GOP leader’s initial decision to stand by her. But the former president is still lukewarm on McCarthy, we’re told, and loyalty with Trump often runs only one way.
Of course, the midterms are a long ways away, and helping to lead Republicans back to the House majority could go a long way with his critics. But while Cheney is the one getting canned this week, McCarthy won’t come out unscathed, either.
As I said, relax, enjoy PB and grace us with your political insight which is not insubstantial rather than worrying about what we think of you. I have already noted, and I think I speak for all of PB, we love you.
Because you do seem to bang on about Palestine.